


Fools Rush In

by kyrieanne



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-13
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-15 00:44:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 94,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3431759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyrieanne/pseuds/kyrieanne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An apocalyptic romance, or 5 times Leslie does something foolish. A dystopian AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea how this happened.

Leslie Knope didn’t have a type – unless you include incredibly passionate, darkly mysterious political men who play the organ – until she met Ben Wyatt.  
  
She never felt that pull before him.  
  
It was a string anchored in her abdomen. Like the tilt of gravity, it pulled her beyond her control.  
  
Leslie Knope didn’t have a type; she had never just fallen. Even Mark had been a conscious choice. Granted that decision had been based on faulty observation skills, but still she had decided she wanted Mark.  
  
But Ben Wyatt was different. She didn’t decide. He was just a current that towed her under until her life was headed in a direction even her Master Plan couldn’t account for.

 

**

_“The building has feelings?”_

_“I’ll get what I need from the spreadsheets.”_

_“Is there a non-gay way to ask him to go camping with me?”_

**

Leslie gets to the Snakehole before everyone else on purpose. She wants to sip a beer and figure out what happened that afternoon. She had been rendered speechless.  _That_  had never happened.

Leslie replays the meeting, muses on it, for the length of a beer. Strange details sneak into her imagination: his white checked shirt, the size of his hands, and the way his hair made her fingers itch. She wants to touch it and see if it was as soft as duck down. It looks like it.

She orders a second beer because she still doesn’t understand why those details are there. This man was an ass. Why did she notice the tight draw of his mouth? Why did she wonder if he was always that cool and remote?

Leslie has moved onto a margarita by the time Ann shows up. She tries to make her voice nonchalant, “Ann, have you ever been attracted to a guy who you don’t like?”

Ann steals Leslie’s lime, “That sums up pretty much every guy I dated in college.”

Leslie frowns, “But why? Why would you want someone who annoys you?”

“Well,” her best friend tips her head, “either because you have low self-esteem or because it’s not that simple.”

“What do you mean it’s not that simple?”

Ann pauses, “Leslie, are we talking about you?”

There is a moment of panic and Leslie gulps her margarita, drains it, and swipes the last of the salt off the rim with her pointer finger. She waves a dismissive hand, “Of course not. I just picked up Cosmo at the doctor’s office last week and there was this advice column about wanting a guy you hate and I wondered what kind of woman would do that.”

Ann eyes her warily, but shrugs, “Well, I can’t say speak for any other women, but my bad choices stemmed from low self-esteem and a desperate feeling I needed a guy to make me happy.”

“But you’re a beautiful nurse…”

Ann smiles, “Leslie, not all women are as strong as you are.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you have this gift for being exactly who you are at all times. You never do anything foolish.”

Leslie stares into the bottom of her drink. She doesn’t think Ann is right. She feels incredibly foolish right now.

Ann knocks her elbow, “This has gotten way too serious. More drinks?” Leslie nods and Ann gets up to go to the bar.

She feels it then, the tug, and it draws her eye toward the door. There he is. He’s come with Chris, the other state auditor. Chris bounces on the balls of his feet like he is about to break out into a sprint. But Ben, Ben, hangs back. He’s wearing a different button down, a pale blue one, and it is untucked. Leslie has the stray thought that tonight he is a little untucked too. He isn’t the buttoned down accountant. Not in the half-light of the Snakehole. He’s something else entirely. More human, she decides, and definitely hotter.

Way hotter.

He catches her stare and as if he could read her thoughts he raises an eyebrow. Leslie looks away, busies herself with the remnants of her drink, and tries to figure out what the hell was wrong with her.

**

Ben isn’t sure what he is doing here, at the birthday party of a girl he doesn’t know, who stares at him, and gives him the creeps. Chris wanted to go. Of course Chris wanted to go. Chris leeches off of other people’s lives. It’s his way of coping with the demands of the road. Ben’s way of coping was to bunker down. He never went out like this and after today’s disastrous meeting with Leslie Knope he certainly shouldn’t be here.

 _Really Wyatt,_ Ben tells himself,  _it wasn’t anymore of a disaster than other meeting today_. It just felt epically worse. She had just frozen and he was the reason. Like a rabbit pinned beneath the gaze of a predator, Leslie Knope had gone into survival mode.

It bothered the hell out of him.

That was why he is here. He should probably admit that. There was no use in denying it.

He watches her for a while. She is with a friend, a pretty tall brunette who looks exactly like Chris’ type, and they appear to be drinking, heavily. Ben won’t lie. It looks like damn fun. He hangs on the edge of her gaze and wonders what it is about her that draws him like a moon to planet. There is a definite orbiting to his path here tonight.

She has really pretty blond hair, Ben decides, that isn’t bleached. It is natural and he decides he likes that about her. And there is a curl to it that causes the corners of his mouth to turn up. It is whimsical and he wonders if she is too. Does she know how to have fun?

 _Get it together Wyatt_.

But then she throws her head back and laughs. It is a cackle. There is nothing ladylike in her laugh, but Ben likes that more than he should. It is an unencumbered laugh. Like her hair, it is natural. And when she laughs, Ben notices the arch of her neck. The spot where he knows her pulse beats against skin draws his eye. He imagines what it would be like to press his lips there. He doesn’t know what he would do next. He just wants to kiss that spot on her neck, that hidden curve. That would be enough.

**

 _“I just talked to everyone in this bar and no-one wants you here.”_  
  
**“** Um, okay, then I’ll-I’ll just see you tomorrow.”  
  
**“** Mm-hmm.”  
  
**“** Sorry to bother you.”  
  
**“** Get out of here.”

**

Leslie sighs and leans against the hood of her car. According to her chart it will be another hour before she is safe to drive home. The Snakehole is closed. Chris already poured Ann into a cab. Leslie could call a cab too, but then her car would be stuck here tomorrow and she wanted to go into the office early. She had a government to save.

Everything around her swirls.  _Whoa_. She drank way more than she should. She grips the hood and squeezes the muscles in her thighs. It causes blood to rush to her head and the swimming stops. She should really make a list – a list of steps so she isn’t completely hung over tomorrow – but everything is a little fuzzy right now, “Ohhh,” she groans.

“Leslie?”

_Dammit. Ben Wyatt._

Her head snaps in the direction of the voice. He stands on the edge of the parking lot. Vaguely Leslie realizes he’d come from the direction of Ramsett Park.

“Leslie?” He approaches but doesn’t close the distance between them.  
  
She holds her head in her hands, “It’s two in the morning,” she mumbles.

“Are you alright?”

The list! She should make that list. A list will be helpful if she wants to get out of this with a shred of her dignity. And she knows the first step on it:  get home, “Can you drive me?”

“What?”

“I can’t drive. Not for another hour. My chart says so.”

Ben hesitates. She’s having trouble remembering why he is so skittish. Is it a nervous tick?

“Fine, don’t help me,” she mumbles.

“No, Leslie,” he starts and closes the distance between them, “I just thought you hated me.”

“I do.”

“Oh,” he straightens and Leslie notices that he has stubble. She wonders what it would be like to have it rub against her skin. Goosebumps flail up her arms.

“But I need you,” she hiccups. That didn’t come out right. She starts to fix it, but the words come out a jumble as the world begins to spin again and all she manages is, “Ohhhhhh.”

“Hey,” Ben captures her elbow, “I’ll drive you home.”

“That’s the first thing on the list.”

“What list?”

“My get away from you list. Have Ben Wyatt, life ruiner, drive me home.”

His mouth quirks up, “Of course it would be.”

**

It takes three houses before Leslie manages to correctly identify her own. They pull into the driveway of a craftsman bungalow and Leslie throws her keys at him and stumbles out of the car.  
  
Ben manages to catch her around the waist, “Hey, steady there,” he holds her up even though she bats his hands away, “there you go.”

He says the last bit near her ear and catches the scent of raspberries and something darker he can’t identify, something like campfires.

“Just for the record,” Leslie slurs across her yard, “I don’t like you.”

“Duly noted,” Ben tightens his grip on her waist and feels the bump of her hipbone under his fingers. They reach the bottom of her stairs and Leslie turns in his grasp. Her chest bumps against his and Ben can’t help it – he tightens his hold tighter.  
  
“Just for the record,” he looks down at her. Her eyes are blue like water in sunlight and her pupils are wide. She is not hazily drunk. He has her attention, “I don’t like you either.”

Ben can’t help it. His fingers itch to brush the strand of hair that has fallen across her forehead. He tucks it behind her ear and feels her exhale as he does it. Her breath rushes across the inside of his wrist. Neither of them moves for what feels like nothing and forever at the same time.

“Do you think I’m foolish?” she whispers.

Ben doesn't lie to her, “A little bit.”

“About you?”

“What about me?”

“Am I foolish about you?”

The question feels heavier than it should, like it is a question of honor.

Ben pushes the thought aside, “Not any more than I am about you,” he take the half-step so their hips brush and she leans fully against him like a personified sigh. Her head dips and rests on his chest. He tests her name, “Leslie?”

“Hmmm?”

“How drunk are you?”

She looks at him, “A little drunk.”

“Too drunk to know better or just drunk enough not to care?”

“I’m not sure.”

Ben knows he should let her go. He should do what is right and honorable. But see Leslie Knope doesn’t make him feel like himself. Something about her tips everything in him off kilter. The horizon curves differently around her.

“I want to kiss you,” he confesses.

She shakes her head and it knocks that damn curl loose again, “But you hate me.”

“I said I don’t like you. There’s a difference,” Ben murmurs.

It doesn’t seem to make a difference to her because it is Leslie who kisses him. She slips her fingers up his neck and into his hair. She arches her back and that unties the last knot in Ben’s self-control. He pulls her against him, wraps both arms all the way around her, and presses her body against his. There is a sigh and Ben couldn’t say whose it is. They stumble backwards and up the stairs.

“God damn,” Ben drags his mouth away, “god damn you can kiss.”

“Stop talking,” Leslie gasps and pulls his head back down.

Ben is happy to obey. Leslie opens her mouth beneath his and it is intoxicating. Their tongues dance and he is overwhelmed. His hands drag up her body and cup her face, but Leslie pulls on his wrists. She tugs his hand down to her breast and Ben is thrilled. He palms her breast, testing its weight, and when he runs a thumb across her nipple, even through the material of her blouse, it elicits a moan out of her that causes his legs to tremble. They waver on the porch and Ben has enough blood left in his brain to know that he needs to get her inside. Soon. Quick. Fast.

He backs her up against the door, pins her there, and languishes in the feel of her body against his. She hitches a leg around his waist and it exposes him to her center. He presses into her there and cups her ass. He can’t get close enough with all these clothes on. Somehow he locates her keys in his pocket. By sheer luck it is the third key that unlocks her door. Ben can barely get it into the knob because Leslie’s hands have inched up under his shirt and splayed across his back. He is shaking. Her nails dig in and Ben hopes they leave marks.

They stumble into the house and Ben kicks the door shut with his foot. She starts toward the stairs, but Ben isn’t going to make it that far. He gathers her up in his arms and presses her against the wall. He kisses her firmly and holds her chin still with two fingers. They stand still in the half-light of the moon, which pours in through windows. It casts them in shadow.  
  
“I need you,” he says. Even he is shocked by the intensity of his voice, “Can I have you?”

She seems to understand the implication: right here, right now. Her eyes are so large. Ben never knew eyes could be so round and deep. But there isn’t fear. If there were fear or haziness he’d find a way to stop.  
  
No, her eyes burns and prickles his skin. It stirs something in the pit of his stomach, like waking a sleeping dragon, and Ben does something he never does. He lets go completely.

**

There is something pressing into Leslie’s back. It is probably a framed document. She can’t remember right now what hangs next to her door.  
  
All she knows right now is the feel of Ben pressing into her core, urging her higher until she is on her tiptoes.  
  
All she knows is that his hands, those wonderful wide hands, are exploring every inch of her, undressing her, as if his next breath depended on it. Her clothes go somewhere and somehow his go somewhere too and they press front to front. Her nipples rub the hair on his chest and that sends thrills pulsating through her. She cries out.

“Fuck,” he mumbles. He roots his mouth on her neck right where her pulse beats. He kisses her there, but she pushes his head down. She wants him somewhere else. He obeys and when he takes her breast in his mouth and sucks, Leslie melts. Her legs hitch up over his hips and his penis presses into the inside of her thigh. His arms hold her up against the wall and Leslie knows she only needs to arch for him to enter her. The tip of him rubs against her and she goes wet. But his mouth is still on her breast and all of it…it is too much. She is falling down a path too steep to stop herself. She doesn’t know which sensation to follow. All of it is too bright, too intense.

“Ben,” she whimpers.

He answers her with a thrust. He enters her and it centers the pain and pleasure. All of her nerve endings begin and finish in her core as he pumps. The first strokes are off. She bumps against the wall, but Ben tries to cradle her head and she has the fleeting thought that that is kind of sweet of him.

“Fuck,” he breathes.  
  
Leslie finds it in her to laugh, “You keep saying that.”

“Holy fuck,” he kisses her, “you are good.”

There are too many words. Leslie shakes her head and moans.

“Leslie,” his voice is intense, but softer somehow, “Leslie open your eyes. It’ll be better if you look at me.”

She hesitates. She can’t even begin to think about what this all means. It means nothing until she opens her eyes. If she opens her eyes it means something because it isn’t just someone. It is this someone. Ben Wyatt. State auditor and life ruiner. Amazing lover and the man calling out her name.

His pumping rocks her body and together they build something. It is growing in her core and Leslie can feel the precipice. She is almost there and from the way his arms tremble he is too.

“Come with me,” his words are ground out from panting.

And she does. Leslie opens her eyes and blue melts into brown as they fall together. Her pelvis buckles and strains to take all of him in her, to keep him close as long as possible. She throws her head back and her toes curl under as a pleasure as bright as the sun overwhelms her. Her body chases it, holds still, in hopes that the orgasm will not leave her. And it doesn’t. It stretches on and on until her muscles cannot tense any longer and she and Ben puddle to the floor.

Ben takes refuge in the curve of her neck. His lips find her pulse again and rest there. He holds them both together as the orgasm reverberates like ripples in a still pond. Leslie lies in his embrace and wonders fleetingly what the hell she just did.

**

In the shadowy morning light the man looks at the City Hall. He adjusts the basket on his arm. Inside, his charge does not stir. The sleeping medicine he mixed in with her formula was enough to quiet her on the plane and then in the car. He appraises the sign: Pawnee, Indiana. He looks up and down the quiet street. In the morning hours the only signs of life are the changing stoplights, which blink for no one.

Maple trees line the street and there are park benches. He considers if this is the right place, but he knows there will be no truly safe place once the bombs go off. Pawnee, Indiana is as small town as you can get. There is a barbershop and a fountain across the street from City Hall. If she isn’t safe here then she won’t be safe anywhere.

He takes the steps to City Hall two at a time. He slips in the front doors and waits as the elderly security guard shuffles by. He takes a few hallways looking for the right place to leave her. It doesn’t matter who finds her, he figures. What matters is that she is kept here until it is safe to retrieve her.

He decides to leave her on the front desk of the Parks Department because there is a bit of him that is still nostalgic. He grew up across the street from a park and remembers the park rangers who taught his rec classes. Good people dedicated their lives to cultivating parks. He’ll leave her with them, he hopes. He has to trust someone. And before he leaves he tucks the note into her basket and checks one last time to make sure she is asleep. He doesn’t linger long though because there is other work to be done. But he can’t help but burn the image of her sleeping into his mind. She really is such a sweet baby.

It is too bad the whole world is going to rain fire down around her.

**

Ben stayed the night. They fucked again on her stairs and then in her bed just as the sun broke the horizon. Leslie didn’t use the word make love because that wasn’t what it was. It was sex. It was desperate and charged. Her body had bruises and in the shower she examined them. She felt branded and she wasn’t sure if she liked that or not, but part of her also didn’t care.

He hadn’t been sweet, but he had been kind. Neither of them felt the need to say much. But there had been a lingering kiss after they finished the third time. She started to get up, to walk him out, but Ben shook his head and pressed his lips to her temple. He’d show himself out and Leslie had turned over to go back to sleep. She was determined not to think too much about it. There was nothing to analyze. It meant exactly what it meant.

She didn’t think about it all the way into the office. She kept her mind busy as she let herself into City Hall and up until the threshold of the Parks Department office. She promised herself thirty seconds to consider her heart right before she opened those doors. Thirty seconds consideration was all she was going to give it because otherwise she would be in danger of wrecking herself in worry if she had done the right thing.

Thirty seconds.

***

April Ludgate has done a lot of things she hates for the sake of her job…like pretty much everything she’s done, but a baby is too much.

  


When she arrived at the office Leslie set the carrier on her desk with a charge, “April this is a great responsibility.”

“I don’t want it.”

“This little girl was abandoned and we can’t rest until she is safely back in the hands of someone who loves her. Are you going to help me with that?”

“Jerry’s the gross father. Have him take care of her.”

“Leslie, I’d be happy. I do have three daughters…”

“Shut up Jerry,” Leslie just tips her eyebrows at April, “Now April I’m serious. I have to go find Ann. She’ll know what to do. She’s a nurse.”

“I don’t remember her having a degree in parents,” April sinks further into her seat.

Leslie does that thing April hates – where she holds her head real still and blinks real slow, “Can I count on you, April?”

“Fine! I’ll watch the dumb baby.”

Leslie smiles, steps away, but grabs the permanent markers out the cup on April’s desk.

“I’ll just steal them from Jerry,” April calls out.  
  
But Leslie is already out the door, “There better not be a single mark on that child!” is the last thing she says.

April settles back in her chair.  
  
The little girl is okay.  
  
Not that April would ever admit it. She has big blue eyes and blond curls. She’s practically a doll except for her tear-streaked face. She stares back at April with a solemn look as if she knows not to try any of that cute nonsense.  
  
April tips her head sideways and stares, waiting for the baby to blink, and when the girl doesn’t even blink after April’s eyes have gone cross-eyed from trying to stay open April decides maybe not every baby is like a hairless cat. Maybe they can be kinda not dumb.

**

Inside Leslie is freaking out, but she forces herself to catch her breath before she calls Ann. She hides in the doorway next to Ann’s office, presses a hand to her stomach, and breathes. What Leslie didn’t tell April or anyone else in the Parks department is that there was a note.  
  
A baby was left on their registration desk with nothing more than a note.  
  
A note made out to her:

_Leslie Barbara Knope – Go big or go home._

Leslie has no idea what it means, but it is meant for her. Besides her name, the phrase  _Go big or go home_  is something her mother always said. The first thing Leslie did when she found the baby was call Marlene, rouse her out of bed, and demand an answer.

“What? Shhhh. She’ll hear you. Nothing sweetie…”

“Mom,” Leslie turned her back to the sleeping baby, “is that a man’s voice I hear?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Leslie rolled her eyes and tucked her head down, “Mom, did you leave something for me at the Parks desk? A package perhaps?”

“Why would I do that? Ohhhhh…honey I got to go.”

“Mom, wait…”

But Marlene had hung up and the hand Leslie held the phone with dropped down by her side. Leslie hadn’t said anything about the baby to her mother.  
  
It was all too strange and until Leslie understood it all better she felt secretive and protective.

In the half-light of the morning she stared at the sleeping baby in the carrier, turned the note over, and wondered what the hell this was about. Between this and her dalliance with Ben Wyatt last night it felt like Leslie had stepped out of her own life into some alternate version.  
  
It was an alternate version in which Leslie slept with a man she didn’t even like and fell in love with strange babies. She studied her: the whisper of eyelashes against cheeks and plump fingers curled around her blanket. She was all innocence and sweetness and vulnerability. She made Leslie’s heart hurt.

When Donna showed up in the office Leslie snapped out of it. It all felt…suspicious. This wasn’t a joke or misunderstanding. She felt jerked around by the note. It was too personal not to be taken seriously.

The baby woke and cried until Jerry had suggested she want to be held. Gingerly Leslie picked her up, rocked her, and frantically searched for what to do. She needed to call authorities – Child Protective Services – but when the little girl’s tiny fist curled around the collar of Leslie’s shirt she felt an overwhelming desire to hold her and never let her go.

_Who would do something like this? Who would abandon a child?_

Whoever it was, Leslie vowed, they would answer.

But for now Leslie knew she needed to contact the authorities. It was the right thing to do even if she was afraid it meant the little girl would disappear into a network of social workers. She tried to tell herself that was how it was supposed to work.  
  
This wasn’t her little girl. She wasn’t her responsibility. Even if there had been a note.

**

Ron Swanson thinks the government has rendered people helpless. No one knew how to do anything for himself anymore. No one can fix a shower or properly use a length of canvas for shelter. He doesn’t know why it bothers him so much this morning except maybe seeing how upset Leslie gets when Child Protective Services comes to take the little girl away. It is obvious Leslie has attached herself to this child, and as far as children go Ron must admit she is an excellent specimen, and it bothers him that someone could not take care of their own child. And now Leslie feels responsible and after they left she went into her office, shut the door, and sat still for a long time.

Watching her, Ron feels his mustache twitch. And when his mustache twitches it means he is going to do something he is going to regret.

**

“You should go after her,” Ron stands in the doorway of Leslie’s office.

“What?”

“You should see if they’ll release her into your custody,” he says, “someone needs to take care of her until they can find who she belongs too.”

Leslie looks at the idea binders piled up by her elbow, the budget analysis, and mountain of paperwork looming ahead of her and she shakes her head, “No. She’s not my responsibility. My job is to fix this government and save people’s jobs.”

“There is no fixing government,” Ron sips his coffee, “and besides its my job to save your job. Not the other way around.”

Leslie smiles sadly, “I appreciate what you are trying to do, but I just need to focus on work. Work is the priority.”

Ron looks at her hard and Leslie squirms under his silence. Finally he says on his way out, “That doesn’t sound like the Leslie Knope I know.”

**

“Where is Leslie Knope?” Chris looks at Ron. Ben pretends to be reading the budget summary Ron passed across the desk. It is fair. It calls for a 15% reduction in the Parks budget. Ron explains Leslie wouldn’t be making the meeting. Something came up. Something personal.

Half of him is elated that she isn’t in the meeting. He can deliver the bad news easily enough to Ron Swanson. The man is strangely delighted that the government is shutting down. The other part of him worries if Leslie’s absence is due to him and what happened between them last night. But then he checks his own ego. He doesn’t know Leslie Knope well, but there is no doubt that she would never let a one night stand get between her and protecting Pawnee from him.

Ben thins his lips as he delivers the news to Ron, who receives it with steady glee. The whole meeting is short which is not what Ben anticipated. He thought Leslie would be here to fight him on the very idea of a government shutdown. He has to admit he was looking forward to the sparring.

Afterwards, curiosity gets the best of him and he chases Ron down in the hall.

“Is…is everything okay?” Ben tried to ask nonchalantly.

“She had to go to the hospital to see someone.”

“Her family?”

“No, a child was left in the Parks department this morning and Leslie was the one to find her. She was going to the hospital where the baby was taken for observation. She feels responsible.”

“But she’s not. Responsible. She just found her.”

Ron raises an eyebrow, “Try telling Leslie that. She feels responsible to the world.”

Later, Ben muses on this. The Leslie Knope he knew before last night did feel responsible. All you had to do was look at the way she spent money on programs and her passionate outcry against the work he and Chris technically were here to do. Leslie felt responsible, responsible for the world in a way that was old-fashioned, out-of-place, and unique.

But then there was the Leslie of last night. The one who had arched her back to drive him deeper inside of her. Who pushed his mouth until it landed on just the right place. That Leslie hadn’t felt responsible to anyone but herself and Ben can’t lie it was incredibly sexy.  
  
It turns him on that she so rarely chose to be selfish and it was him she was selfish for, or at least for what happened between them. She’d wanted him and he’d wanted her and it had been that simple.  
  
It throws him, that he made Leslie Knope selfish and he can’t lie it makes him even more curious to know what it would mean to be someone Leslie Knope feels responsible for. He wonders what it would be like.

**

_Have you ever been part of a government body before?_

_Uh…I have…small town called Partridge Minnesota._

_Why does that sound familiar? You’re Benji Wyatt. … Oh my God, you were so cute!_

_Aww…well thanks!_

_What was the song you played at the swearing in ceremony?_

_Whoope there it is…_

_God I was so jealous of you._

_Well you shouldn’t have been. It ended up kind of ruining my life. And now I’m balancing budgets to show people I’m responsible. So I can run for office again someday and not be laughed at. I mean you want to run for office someday, right?_

_Yeah, how did you know?_

_Well you’re going to have to be able to make decision like this, Leslie. You have to be harsh._

**

Leslie isn’t sure how it happened – Ben Wyatt showed up at her house with a six-pack and Chinese food – and it should have been awkward, but it wasn’t. Now he sits next to her on the couch. They haven’t touched except in the passing of plates back and forth and they haven’t talked about last night. When she opened the door he had held up the cans and said, “Want a beer?”

And it works. The confusion and guilt and general unease she’d been feeling since CPS came to pick up the little girl faded at least for a little while. Ben admits Ron told him what happened and thought she could use a beer and someone to drink it with.

“How’d you know I’d be here?”

“I drove by before picking up dinner,” Ben admitted, “I thought you might be at a friend’s house if you had a bad day.”

“I have a best friend.”

“The brunette Chris put in a cab last night?”

Leslie nods. And then Ben tells her about the government shutdown and they talk about Partridge and Ice Town and  _Whoop There It Is_  and Leslie finds she’s not as upset as she should be. Maybe it hasn’t sunk in yet or maybe she is distracted by the baby and the note or maybe Leslie just doesn’t believe him. Ben seems to struggle to hold faith, but Leslie has complete faith in Pawnee and its citizens. They could survive anything.

“If you are elected you’ve got to prove you can be responsible,” Ben is saying, “And part of being responsible is making the harsh decisions. Doing the unpopular thing.”

Leslie sits on her knees and faces Ben, “And part of it is refusing to believe there isn’t another option. There is always another choice.”

He takes a swig of beer and sets the bottle down. Leslie watches him. She’s not sure why he is here and he hasn’t offered any explanation. If it was just sex she doesn’t think he’d have bothered with the food and certainly not all of the talking. Ben scoots to face her and their knees are just inches apart. He rests his arm on the back of the couch.

“You did the right thing today – calling CPS,” he said, “I hope you know that.”

Leslie touches her jean pocket where she knows the note is tucked safely away. She chews on her bottom lip, “There was a note. With the baby.”

“Ron didn’t mention that.”

“That’s cause I didn’t tell him. I didn’t tell anyone. The note. It’s made out to me,” She slips it from her pocket and hands it to Ben.

He reads it, glances at her, and reads it again, “Do you have any idea what it means?”

“No,” Leslie takes it back and folds it between the pages of her latest political biography. Hopes it will smooth out the creases and wishes she could fold herself into a book, flatten the complications that have crept into her life.

The baby cried when they took her away and it wasn’t until her cries were drowned out by the doors to the Park department that Leslie realized she didn’t even have a name. This little girl had nothing in the world save that note which tethered her to Leslie. And Leslie had undone the tether and sent this helpless baby into the ether.

When she lifts her eyes to Ben his fingers tug her elbow toward him and she realizes there are tears littering her cheek. They are the slow, silent type of tears. This wasn’t the outpouring of grief but the slow leak of guilt. Leslie lets him pull her into his lap and tangle his hands in her hair. She curls her legs around him so that she straddles him and buries her face against his shoulder. It isn’t a sexy position, not with her crying, but it is comforting.

They sit like that for a long time and Leslie realizes he isn’t telling her what to do. He doesn’t excuse it, but he doesn’t condemn it either. Instead his thumb strokes her cheek, runs the length of her jaw, and wanders to the dip of her t-shirt on the rise of her chest. Leslie pulls back and Ben freezes.

“I’m sorry,” he reddens.

“Ben,” she leans forward so their foreheads touch. Ben’s breath hitches, “will you…” she swallows like the next word is stuck in her throat, “fuck me? Will you fuck me so I don’t have to think? Everything feels different and I don’t know why. I don’t understand what is going on and I just don’t want to hav-“

He cuts her off with a kiss. He is pressing her back and they fall onto the couch. His tongue swipes and Leslie opens her mouth under his. It is like being enveloped. She shudders when his hands run up the length of her body and when they reach the end he emits a groan. It makes Leslie feel powerful. Like the feel of her is enough to send man to utterances.

Their hands make neat work of clothes until there is just underwear between them. Leslie bends a knee and opens up her legs wider as if to ask Ben in, but he is pulling back and it is like being dunked into water.

“You can’t stop!” She sits up after him

“Come on. I want to try something,” he stands and offers his hand. Leslie takes it hesitantly, but she complies as Ben leads her through her own house and up to her own bathroom. He turns her shower on and gets two towels out of the closet, sets them on the toilet, “I’ve been thinking of this all day,” he stands right in front of her and tugs on her hips with his fingers, “I saw this shower last night and I’ve been thinking about what it would mean to take you in it.”

Leslie loves showers. She gets her best ideas in showers. So years ago she splurged when she renovated her bathroom. The walk-in is glass and steam and peace. Steam begins to fill in around her and Leslie reaches for the band of Ben’s boxers. She pushes them down and finds him hard. She wraps her fingers around him and looks up, “Okay,” she says.

It feels a little melodramatic when she says it, but the kiss is incredibly sweet. He bends his head and closes the distance between them. His deft fingers shed her underwear and bra and Leslie tugs him into the shower. She steps beneath the spray coming from every angle. Water gets in her eyes and mouth, but Ben – it is all Ben – Ben overpowers the sensation of even her own perfect shower.

Last night had been quick, hot, and fast. This is slow and languid. The water pours over them and Leslie lets herself be pressed against the tile. She relaxes as Ben explores her like a map. Eventually he dips down to his knees and presses kisses along her stomach to the curve of her hipbones and lower. She hooks a leg over his shoulder and knots her fingers in his hair. When he finds that spot, that perfect spot, and darts in and out she gasps. He responds by fluttering his tongue and she gasps again. Her hips undulate and her leg twitches at the knee.

“Don’t stop,” she urges.

Straining, Leslie tips her head back and greedily receives as Ben brings her to orgasm. She strains every last sensation from it and when he stands up she takes more. She pulls him into her and moves up and down, bracing against the wall. She sets the pace. She takes and takes until he is a series of grunts and then a long, “Fuck,” into her neck and finally stillness.

For long minutes the only sound in the bathroom is the sound of water pelting the glass and pinging their skin. Ben is folded around her and they lean into the wall. Leslie muses, her head in the concave of his chest, that they’ve only made it to a bed once yet. Her legs tremble from liquid muscles and all she wants is her bed with him in it. But she stands there a bit longer because this is foolish.

It is foolish to think that sight and sensation would drive away her uncertainty. But just like Ann said, it isn’t that simple. Foolishness is not a one-dimensional emotion so easily dismissed. She doesn’t know why she keeps ending up in this place with Ben Wyatt. She doesn’t know why she kept the note, but sent the baby away and she had no logical reason to feel ill at ease, but she does.

“Leslie,” Ben mumbles into her neck, “tell me you don’t hate me.”

She rubs the space where his hair stops and says, “I don’t hate you.”

He doesn’t look at her, but says with a relieved sigh, “That’s a place to start then.”

**

The night before the day when the world ended April dreams that Orin painted the world white. It isn’t like his other work. This time the white is hot and bright. Brighter than daylight. It is luminescent and April wakes up with an arm covering her eyes as if trying to shield herself, even in her dreams.

It is the sirens that wake her up. She is staying with Andy at his friend’s house and she nudges him awake.

“Wha?” he slurred.

But April sits very still. Her feet are tangled in the covers and she shushes Andy. She normally ignores sirens, but this is different. This isn’t a single siren, but an echo of them. She gets up from the bed and goes to look out the window and she realizes that everyone is out in the street. The street lights are out but there were head lights shining and people pointing flashlights skyward as if stars were made of words.

Her eyes follow them and she sees it against a night sky: the glow of a mushroom cloud. 

***

April Ludgate didn’t care about anything until the world blew up.

  


Andy follows her out to the street and with strangers they stand transfixed at the cloud as sirens wail above their heads. She strains her neck and wonders vaguely if she is going to die today.  
  
It is vague because April doesn’t know what it means to die. She doesn’t know what it means to bleed or be hungry.  
  
She realizes that her whole life has been one free from pain, real pain. The pain she feels when her parents don’t get her isn’t real pain. Neither was her first broken heart or the lost friends who turned out to not be real friends at all. None of that would compare, April realizes, to what was about to come.  
  
In the span of thirteen seconds, April grows up. She tugs on Andy’s arm, “Come on,” she says low, “we need to get out of here.”

**

“Leslie,” Ben shakes her, “Leslie, wake up. Something’s happened.”

“Hmmm.”

“Leslie, seriously get up,” Ben gets off the bed and feels on the floor for his clothes – realizes they are downstairs – and swears. He tries the light, but it doesn’t work. He’s not surprised. The red alarm clock has stopped glowing. He goes to the window and stares at the cloud and people in the street. And then it hits him what has happened and he closes his eyes for a long moment trying to wrap his mind around it before he says her name, “Leslie!”

He doesn’t mean to yell, but she needs to wake up.

“What?” She’s annoyed.

He braces himself against the windowsill. How do you tell someone this? “There’s been some sort of accident. An explosion.”  
  
This gets her up.

“The Sweetums Factory?”

“No, too far away. Too big.  I’m thinking Indianapolis maybe.”

“That’s 90 miles from here. There’s no way -,”

“It’s a mushroom cloud.”

She stands by his elbow now and Ben moves so she can see. He touches her hip bone more to anchor himself than to comfort. He leans into her back. They are both still naked. His mind is racing – considering the distance from Indianapolis and size of the cloud. He’s forcing himself not to think about what he knows.  
  
He can’t do anything until the winds pass. Until the fallout.  
  
He remembers what his mother told him after Ice Town – it’s the fall that’ll kill you – and he knows more than ever that this is true.

“Leslie,” he rubs her shoulders – she is shaking -, “we need to get to City Hall.”

**

There are few people who Ron doesn’t actively dislike, but he does feel responsible for his department. So when he sees the cloud and the sky light up he knows what it is. He is a survivalist. He knows what a nuclear explosion is. And he knows that no one else will have any clue what they are doing. The government has rendered them all helpless.

He goes for Leslie first because she’s the easiest to find.  
  
She’s at City Hall with the two state auditors and the nurse. They are gathered with other volunteers, all wearing orange vests and hard hats, in the City Council room. Someone is shouting out instructions: the power grid is down and the generator at the hospital won’t last forever. They are getting reports of wildlife acting strange:  the raccoons are filling into neighborhoods. A fire has broken out at the bread factory. There is mass looting over in Eagleton and a lot of confused and worried citizens. And no one can get a hold of anyone outside of Pawnee.

“This isn’t a regular explosion,” In the midst of the crowd, Ben, the state auditor, is arguing with Mayor Gunderson, “this is nuclear.”

Mayor Gunderson waves his hands, “No. No. No. There are no nuclear power plants in Indiana. It was a major explosion or maybe a military accident. We need to send people to help.”

“That is the worst thing you could do. You’re sending them right in the fallout. You’ll be signing their death sentence!”

“I’ve already sent the police and fire department to take their vehicles and head down the interstate. They left an hour ago. They’re almost there.” Mayor Gunderson moves past Ben, “I don’t have time for this.”

Ben starts after him, but Ron grabs him by the arm, “It’s not use son.”

“Asshole,” Ben gives Mayor Gunderson’s back one last stare and then looks at Ron, “When did you get here?”

“I’m here for Leslie and the nurse. I have a certified bomb shelter. There is room for you and the other one,”

“Chris.”

“Yeah, there’s room for both of you if you want. I’m rounding up my department and getting them there before the fallout reaches us.”

“We’ve got at least day before it gets here.”

“Indianapolis is only 90 miles from here,” Ron frowns.

“It wasn’t Indianapolis,” Ben shakes his head, “I thought so at first, but the cloud was too small. I think it was Columbus.”

“But that’s 250 miles. There’s no way we’d see it…”

“On a clear night like tonight there is a good chance we would. From the size of the cloud I’m guessing at least a megaton.”

Ron is still for a long time. It is a wooden stillness that roots him to the floor. His brain does the calculations automatically, “That’s 80 times the size of the bomb we dropped on Hiroshima.”

“I know,” Ben looks around the room at the chaos and speaks quietly, “The cloud you saw, what part of the sky did you see it in?”

“Northwest, why?”

“Leslie and I saw one in the east and other people saw it in the southwest.”

“Are you saying –,”

“There were more than one. One in Columbus and the other in Chicago and another in St. Louis.”

“Then this wouldn’t be just a single terrorist attack,” Ron works hard to keep his voice steady, “this is a multi-city nuclear attack.”

Ben leans into him, “Think about it – Chicago, Columbus, St. Louis – why attack the interior of the U.S.? Chicago is huge, but the other two are nothing compared to New York and L.A.. I don’t mean to sound like an alarmist but I think this was a lot bigger than  we realize.”

“Son, I just saw a mushroom cloud light up my sky. Nothing is too big at this point.”

Ben looks at Ron somberly, “Glad to know I’m not the only one.”

“What do you think we do?”

“We get as many people inside. We gather supplies and we stop any one else from heading out of Pawnee.”

**

Leslie just keeps putting one foot in front of the other. She’s helping move emergency supplies at the hospital. She joined that work team for her own selfish reasons. The baby had been sent to the hospital to get checked out before being turned over to a foster family. She might still be here and Leslie is going to find her.

But no one will stop long enough to answer her questions about a perfectly healthy, nameless baby. She tried to go through the records herself, but had gotten lost in all the bureaucratic paperwork. Now she roams the halls, carrying whatever supplies someone hands her, to wherever they are needed and searching for the baby. Her baby.

She touches the pocket where the note is folded. Ben practically had to put the jeans on her when he dragged her from her own bedroom, downstairs, and into reality. She’d been in shock. She is still in shock. He pulled the pants over her hips, buttoned them, and held her face in his hands.

“Leslie, look at me,” his voice had been low, intent, “I need you to snap out of this. I’m going to take care of you, but I need you to snap out of it.”

“The note…,” she’d mumbled, “I need the note.”

Bless Ben, he took the time to retrieve it from the political biography and place it in her pocket.

He is here at the hospital – somewhere – with Ron. She isn’t exactly sure what they are doing, but she knows Ben is worried. Ron is worried. More worried than she’d ever seen him. She doesn’t know Ben well, but she doubts he worries easily. They joined the team going to the hospital and Leslie lost them in the crowd, heard them talking about stopping paramedics from going somewhere.

Before they’d disappeared, Ben and Ron had extracted a promise from her, Ann, and Chris not to leave the hospital without them. To meet in the hospital lobby at daybreak, when the sun finally came up again.

“Excuse me,” Leslie stops a nurse, “there was a baby brought here yesterday. She was abandoned and they wanted to do a check-up.”

“Was she critical?”

“What? No. I don’t think so.”

The nurse is distracted, starts to back away, “Try the staff day care. Any non-critical children were taken there. Seventh floor. They’re saying it’s going to be days until we get help. The blast must have collapsed every power grid between here and Chicago.”

And then she is gone and Leslie feels the push of people milling past her. She stays rooted to the spot, arms full of bandages, and puts it together. She and Ben had seen a cloud east of Pawnee. A cloud, Ben had muttered on the way to City Hall, a cloud that was too small to be in Indianapolis. He mentioned Columbus. But if other people were thinking Chicago…it dawns on Leslie that there had been two explosions.

That this wasn’t a freak accident somewhere far away.

They were under attack.

Their country was under attack and suddenly the appearance of that baby feels like a warning. It isn’t a coincidence. Leslie knows this as deeply as she knows Pawnee is the greatest city in America, possibly the world. That baby was given to her to keep. She was a charge placed in Leslie’s care and that unease Leslie felt since the moment Ben Wyatt walked into her life was a premonition or something.

She drops the bandages or they roll away – she isn’t certain – but it doesn’t matter. There is a door and a set of stairwells and she doesn’t stop to catch her breath. She runs until she stumbles into the nursery. Two volunteers, wearing neon orange vests like herself care for a dozen children. One of them holds the baby in her arms.

Leslie stretches her hands out and the other woman hands the baby over because Leslie exudes authority. The woman doesn’t question it when Leslie tucks her close, holds her against her ribs, and turns away. Possessive. She is a nameless baby, after all, unclaimed and unmoored. At least someone claims her.

The baby’s eyes are open and she looks at Leslie, or toward Leslie, and for the first time since Ben woke her up Leslie steadies. Something is right in the world. One little thing. This little girl is safe. She isn’t alone anymore.

**

Everything is eerie. There are no lights in Pawnee. In a night April’s town has become the wilderness. A wild of concrete and subdivisions. There is a line around the block of every gas station. April and Andy are on foot moving through Pawnee. She keeps trying to get a phone signal, but it doesn’t work and she won’t let herself stop walking long enough to think. Her parents and sister were in Chicago. It was some dumb art school Natalie wanted to go visit and at the last minute April said she was staying home and fled to Andy’s house.

She doesn’t think about it because April saw two clouds – one towards the east and the other northwest. She’s not dumb. She gets what is happening. If the mushroom clouds hadn’t been enough the animals, running and leaping through yards, would be. She knows there has been an explosion in Chicago. Where her parents and sister are.

“Babe, maybe we should stop,” Andy holds onto her waist, “maybe we should wait.”

“No,” she shakes her head fast, “we just gotta keep walking. We’re going to Ron’s. He’ll know what to do.”

She isn’t sure why Ron is the first person she thought of when it sunk in what was happening around them. The world is raining down fire and the first person she thinks to run to is Ron Swanson.

“Do you think this is the end of the world? Like Terminator?” Andy shouts, “Are you sure those were nuclear weapons?”

A man runs by starts to slow and April grabs Andy by the front of his t-shirt, “You need to keep your voice down,” she breathes, “don’t use that word. People are scared and crazy. We just need to keep our heads down, keep moving, and stay quiet. Okay?”

Andy nods. Behind them, at one of the gas stations, a gunshot pierces the air.

“No one is taking anymore of my goddamn gas,” someone shouts.

There are more shots and April cranes her neck to see down the sidewalk. She can only glimpse a sliver of the gas station parking lot where cars and crowds jostle for space. Someone is standing on the bed of a truck and April gets a bad feeling about all of it. She pulls Andy away.

There is another gunshot and more shouts.

Someone screams a name.

Someone else demands their fair share.

Someone begs and April runs faster.

Andy’s hand is sweaty in her own, but he holds on fast. Their tennis shoes hit pavement and a raccoon runs by their feet, a temporary partner in flight. April tries to think of something, anything, ironic, but she can’t.  
  
Everything is too eerie, too far beyond imagination, like something she would watch on television and think was cool. But in real life it is so not. It is scary as hell. Instead, she and Andy flee under a starry night into a subdivision where the third house on the left is on fire.

**

Ben wants to punch something, someone, as he watches ambulances loaded up with doctors, nurses, and supplies take off east. Another set take off north for Chicago and yet another St. Louis. Someone in charge must have figured out there had been multiple explosions in multiple cities, but he can’t convince anyone that it is a death sentence to head straight toward them.

Instead, Ben stands in the shadow of the ambulance bay. He hears Ron and Ann flank him on either side.

“Any luck?” he asks. He’d sent them together to try and convince the people in charge not to send the caravans out. They’d hoped Ann, a nurse, might be able to convince them to stop.

“No. There is another group going out in fifteen minutes. They’re heading south. Just to see,” Ann hugs her stomach. Ben sees she is shaking, but he doesn’t reach out to comfort her. He just doesn’t have it in him.

“Damn courageous fools. Gonna get themselves killed. Rushing in like that.” Ron mutters softly.

“I tried to stop them,” Ben says, “I told every single one of them what they were headed into, but none of them believed me.”

“Sometimes the truth is too simple to believe,” Ann shakes and this time Ben puts an arm around her, “They don’t want it to be true. Better it be a freak accident than anything nuclear.”

“Ben?”

It is Leslie. They turn and Ann catches Leslie before he does. She’s carrying a baby – Ben guesses the baby from yesterday. He guessed when she jumped at the chance to go to the hospital that she was going to look for the baby.

“You can’t just take a baby, Leslie,” Ann is saying to her. Ben has missed something until he sees the bag slung over Leslie’s shoulder. Formula and diapers peak out of it. He takes it and the carrier from her silently. Ann is still shaking her head, “No. No. No. That baby belongs to someone.”

“For right now she belongs to me,” Leslie insists. Her hair is pulled back with a rubber band and Ben knows now is the wrong time to notice he likes her hair off her face. She rocks the baby who is quiet and wide eyed, “She needs me. I’m taking her.”

Ann thins her lips and Ron claps his hands together. Through the windows the horizon is rimmed with daybreak. It is time to go.

Ben takes Leslie’s elbow in silent support, “Where’s Chris?” he asks.

There is a pause and it is who Ann hesitantly speaks up, “He went east. With the caravan. He’s gone.”

**

April and Andy stand Jerry’s front yard as daylight breaks. It fills the street and in the hazy light April feels like the world is mocking her. Jerry is crumpled in the spot where they found him hours ago. It was his house that had been on fire. He ran out to the store – Gail had wanted ice cream – and come home to fire. No one is really sure how it started. It could have been a down power line or people in the panic. There was no way to know. All Jerry knew was that by the time he got home there were flames licking his lawn and no sign of Gail.

April managed to cobble together from Jerry's wails that he left her laying down in their bedroom. She had taken a sleeping pill and Jerry went out for ice cream so she could have a treat in the morning. She had been stressed lately. Migranes and worries about the girls.

“Jerry, where are your girls?” April crouches next to him. He looks at her vaguely.

“On a road trip. To see their grandmother.”

“Where?”

“Muncie.”

April stands. They need to get to Ron’s. She surveys the house. It is a pile of ash. Soot covers their clothes from pulling Jerry away from the house. He had been trying to climb in through a flaming window.

She tugs on Jerry’s arm, “Come on. We’ve got to move.”

“I can’t leave her.”

“Maybe she got out?” Andy tries, but April just shakes her head.

“Jerry,” she bends down and puts a hand on either side of his face, “you’ve got to move. We’ll come back for Gail. Okay? But right now we’ve got to get you to safety. So you can see your girls again. Okay?”

And for some reason he follows her just like Andy followed. April isn’t sure what well the strength comes from, but she leads the way in the general direction of Ron’s cabin. She walks alone while Andy holds Jerry up and she tries to ignore the faint smell of peppermint ice cream drying on all their clothes.

**

Ron has a truck and Leslie sits in the cabin with him and the baby tucked firmly in her arms. Ann and Ben ride in the bed along with supplies they picked up from Leslie’s house. It works to be a hoarder in the apocalypse.

Leslie feels punch drunk. She knows she is still in shock, but the whole world seems to move in slow motion. All she can do is hold onto the baby and nod numbly when Ron or Ben tell her to do something. Ann hovers. She was the one who let Chris get onto that caravan and no matter how many times she tries to explain – Chris was going to do it no matter how much she begged him not to – Ben doesn’t seem to care. He’s shut down, moving in half-hearted gestures, and if Leslie wasn’t shell-shocked she’d say something. Do something.

But the best she can do is hold on.

Ron’s cabin is up in the foothills surrounding Pawnee. Their headlights cut through the gauzy morning light. There is a honk and a whoop. Ron rolls down the window and shouts something and Leslie realizes he’s shouting names.

It is Andy and April, Tom and Donna, and Jerry. Donna’s Benz is parked in front of the cabin and Leslie feels something tighten up in her throat. It is emotion, all the emotions, and the tears run freely down her face. She tucks her chin into her chest and stares at the baby sleeping quietly.

Ron stops the truck and her friends rush toward them. Someone opens her door and pulls her from the truck. It is Andy and she is enveloped in a hug, “Leslie is that a baby?” he asks but Leslie doesn’t answer.

She just smiles and cries. Donna hugs Ben, swings him around, and tells him he’s pretty tough for a skinny white dude. Ann shakes Ron’s hand. Tom is talking about how he rescued Donna and Donna is correcting him. She came across him and then they found Andy and April and Jerry and then they came here all piled up in her Benz. And from the corner of her eye, Leslie spots April standing close to Ron, telling him something, and Ron pulling her close as April, who Leslie forgets is still so young, buries her face in his shirt. Leslie notices her knees have stopped holding her up. It is all Ron at this point.

Leslie feels Ben’s tentative touch and she leans back into his chest. It feels good to be pressed up against him.

She’ll hold on, she decides, because the world isn’t broken. Not yet.

**

Later, that night, as they sleep in the bomb shelter beneath Ron’s cabin, Leslie feels Ben slip inside her sleeping bag. She lets him because she will soak up any comfort she can take. He leaves the zipper undone, but tangles their legs together.

“One happy memory,” he whispers into her ear, “think of one happy memory.”

“My dad,” Leslie tucks her chin into the warmth of his arm, “my dad used to travel a lot. He was a candy salesman for Sweetums.”

“Of course he was.” She can hear the smile in his voice.

“And he’d send me postcards from all over Indiana. Every town he ever visited. I’d get the cards and it made me so happy to know he was thinking of me. I fell in love with Indiana through those postcards. I love this place.”

Ben is quiet for a long time and Leslie listens to the cadence of their breathing.

“One happy memory,” she says, “think of one happy memory.”

“When you let me inside the other night and sitting on your couch having a beer,” he finally says, “It made me happy that we might be friends.”

She wants to turn and look at him, but she doesn’t. Instead she interlocks their fingers and settles their palms against her stomach, “We’re friends. Definitely friends.”

They are both quiet for a long time. Jerry’s shallow snores are the only sound in the room. Sometimes they hear Ron sleep-fighting and it exhausts Leslie to think of what it would be like to dream like that. She prefers softer dreams. Nothing like this. Nothing like reality.

“Ben?” she whispers.

“Hmm?”

“I couldn’t find my mother and Ann hasn’t heard from her parents in Terre Haute. And Tom doesn’t know if his family in South Carolina is safe and…”

“I know. We’ll deal with it. I promise. After the fallout we’ll deal with it. Together. Friends, ‘member?”

Leslie tries to take comfort in that. She tries to fall asleep as Ben’s breathing evens and his arms around her relax, but she can’t. Her mind is whirling, planning, and trying to imagine what awaits them in the days to come. She wonders what this baby and the note mean. She tries to imagine Jerry’s pain at losing Gail, but the tears sting so she pushes the thought away. Instead, she focuses on Ben who is an unexpected source of comfort in this. She wonders why of all happy memories to pick from he chose one so recent, one that had to do with her…


	2. Chapter 2

It rains for three days.

Pounding, insistent rain that rattles Leslie’s bones. It wants in, Ann whispers, it’s like the big bad wolf and if we don’t let it in it’ll blow our house down.

“It can’t get you.” Ron assures her, but it feels hollow. It may not get them, but it will get everyone else.

  


The rain brings the radiation down over Pawnee. Ben and Ron explain. Ron has a whole library about survival in the closet of his bunker. When everyone else sleeps Leslie reads the books by candlelight. She stays up with the baby, feeds her formula, and begins to arm herself with what she’ll need to know when they emerge. She doesn’t have a binder or her favorite color-coded pens so she scribbles ideas on the back of paper towels.

They are going to need to test the water supply. Someone is going to have to secure the hospital, coordinate the inventory of medical supplies, and relocate the wounded to St. Joseph’s. Then is the food situation. Anything touched by the rain will be inedible. She begins a list of key people to locate: Dale, the owner of the Food n’ Stuffs in town, and that guy who owns that fleet of vans. They’ll need those to transport people to the hospital and food to the distribution centers she’s planned in her head. The list spills onto a second paper towel and Leslie stops. She doesn’t know how many of these people will be alive when she emerges.

And then there is the question of power.

Leslie’s heard Ben and Ron talking in low voices. They say it was an attack and Leslie wants to go, “No shit,” but she doesn’t because Andy and Ann and Tom and Donna still wonder aloud what happened. April and Jerry don’t talk much at all.

If it was an attack there is no way they can expect the power grid to get back up and running any time soon. Rural Indiana is not going to be high on the nation’s priority list. That means they are going to need to ration gas. Leslie adds the organization of generators to key locations to her list.

She pushes the thought aside of how she is going to do all of this. She is no one. A mid-level government official in the least important department. Who is going to listen to her? She pushes the thought aside because it costs too much to think like that. Pawnee needs her and she cannot afford to be plagued by doubts.

They won’t be able to count on outside information either, she realizes, and that might be the most important thing of all.

“Hey Leslie,” Andy nudges her on the second day, “I’m worried about April.”

Leslie looks up from her reading on radiation sickness. The baby – bless her – sleeps soundly in her carrier and Leslie had tuned out the rest of the bunker.

Across the room, April is slumped against the wall, knees pulled up to her chest. She stares blankly and not in the endearing April way.

“She thinks her family is dead cause there was a cloud near Chicago and she hasn’t heard anything…” Andy says, “And I’ve tried everything I know how to do. I’ve sung to her and kissed her and sung again, but she’s all quiet and not like in her cute way. But like she’s all sad. I’m really worried.”

Leslie pats Andy’s arm and points to the baby. He gives her the thumbs up and she goes to sit next to April.

“I know Andy sent you over here. The room is like twenty feet big. I can hear everything,” she says and tips her head away.

Leslie says nothing. Instead she tucks her legs beneath her and leans into April’s shoulder, “This place sucks. I can’t wait to graduate.”

At first this doesn’t illicit much, but after a minute April looks in her direction, “At least summer will kick ass.”

“Yeah, it will,” Leslie says and lays her head on April’s shoulder. She hooks an arm through the girl’s elbow and hangs on. To her credit, April doesn’t push her away. She doesn’t relax under the touch, but at least she doesn’t push her away and Leslie will take that as a win.

**

Ron notices the nurse – Ann – is lonely. He watches her for the first day and realizes that other than Leslie she doesn’t really have anyone in the bunker with her. She doesn’t work for the department. She’s just always been around.

He knows he should be better about her name. It is Ann. Ann Meredith Perkins. He’s known that since the first time Leslie said it. But, see, he’s always thought of her as  _the nurse_  because she’s always taking care of people – namely Leslie, but for a while Andy and then Mark. She’s always the steady, reasonable one and Ron appreciates stoutness. To him, it is one of the highest virtues a woman can have.

But now, the nurse – Ann – is hanging on by tenterhooks. She is gripping sanity so hard that is causing her face to flush pale. She doesn’t want to lose it, but it is right there skimming the surface. Ron admires her effort. He sees the way she pastes on a smile when Leslie comes to sit by her, takes her turn with the baby, and sits by Jerry who really is only a step above catatonic. She tries to console Tom who just keeps tying and untying the silk scarf he had on when the bombs hit. She flirts with him and offers him her bite of the chocolate bar they all split for dessert one night.

She is giving and Ron realizes that her giving makes her lonely. She has no one to offer her comfort. There is a bravery to her loneliness that Ron admires; she may be hanging on by sheer will, but she is hanging on. She doesn’t know about her family – divorced parents and a brother – and he can’t imagine what that is like. He does not worry about his mother or brother. They are surely holed up in their own foxholes. He’ll see them again.

But Ann – and at some point it stops being  _the nurse_ and becomes Ann – Ann is alone. She picks at her cuticles until they bleed and just keeps smiling every time Leslie comes by to ask her if she is okay.

“You have small hands,” Ron sits by her on the second night, “come help me.”

“Do what?”

“There is a leak in the bathroom and I am going to fix it.”

“Uh, okay.”

No one has used the shower since the rain started except for Jerry who numbly said he wanted to wash off. He smelled of smoke and peppermint. There was only so much water in the tanks. Ron had almost protested but then April shook her head no. It was too important.

Ron knows he doesn’t need to fix the leak today, but there is a leak and he teaches Ann how to fix it. He patiently explains the tools and what they do. He talks about the satisfaction he gets from fixing things. Ann listens and while Ron isn’t sure if it helps or not, he hopes that it might.

**

Each night Ben waits for the even breathing of everyone else and finds Leslie in the dark. He touches her shoulder and she scoots the zipper down on her sleeping bag. And in the dark with her body pressed up against his Ben lets himself forget about everything he is carrying. He forgets about the entire world outside of Leslie, himself, and the tiny baby sleeping soundly in her carrier at their elbow.

They talk in whispered bits, entangled like spoons in a drawer. She tells him of her plans after the fallout and Ben bites his tongue. He worries and he knows his worries are well founded, but he can’t say anything without showing his hand and he’s not ready to do that. Not yet.

Ben knows he is skirting something dangerous with Leslie Knope. He is putting everything at risk to climb into her sleeping bag and hold her. He knows this yet he does it because there is something about her that trips him up. It is the softness of her skin and her pretty blond hair. It is her laugh and the obnoxiously great conversation they had about political biographies earlier that day. He wants to take her to D.C. just to see it through her eyes, but when he says that they both get silent. If Chicago is gone then surely D.C. is too.

It is how she moves around the bunker to check on each person. She always seems to know what they need – a hug or silence – to receive even the smallest bit of comfort. It is how she has taken up the mantle of a baby that isn’t even hers. Because she can’t go much longer without a name Leslie names her Grace and Ben finds himself stealing long looks when Leslie holds Grace. They make a picture his heart isn’t quite sure what to do with.

But it is at night when he holds her that Ben knows he is in trouble. It is more than her body or even the things she does for other people. It is her, who she is all on her own, and what she does to him. She makes him feel like there is another option. That this life he’s chosen and this person he’s let himself become doesn’t have to be it. There is someone out there who is better than all the typical bullshit. And that someone - she lets him hold her in his arms.

“Ben,” she whispers on the third night, “why did we hate each other?”

“Cause I was going to shut down your government and strip Pawnee of all things pure and good.” Ben mutters against her neck. He finds the spot where her pulse beats beneath the skin and presses his lips there. Her hips squirm against him and he lets go a low moan into her neck, “You’re not playing fair,” he says.

For three days all they've done is hold each other. In the morning, he leaves before anyone else wakes up and each time he presses a light quick kiss to her lips, but that is it. Now was not the time. But she is turning in his arms so their fronts are pressed together and Ben’s breath catches, “Leslie?”

“Just a little making out,” she presses her lips to his and Ben tangles his hands in her hair. He smiles beneath her kiss and rolls so he is over her. He braces on his elbows and hears her sigh beneath him.

“Shhhh,” he catches her giggle with his lips until it turns back into a sigh.

There is something thrilling about making out like teenagers, of the risk of getting caught, and doing something you’re probably not supposed to do. Ben also knows it is coping mechanism – that touching her under her t-shirt and tracing her clavicle with his tongue – it helps them not have to think. But there is something wonderful about lips exploring her corners, of darting tongues in and out, and kissing until you run out of breath. It is heady and intoxicating. And when her breath catches as he touches her through her pants, Ben knows it is as good for her as it is for him.

At some point she rolls so she is on top of him and he slows them down. His pants are strained beyond what is comfortable and she follows his lead. Their kisses become languid and lazy. Eventually her head finds the concave of his chest and she matches his breathing. In that moment, Ben knows he is in trouble because he’d do anything to protect who she is. Do anything to hold onto a world that has someone like her in it.

**

_“Last year I married two penguins at the zoo, and it turned out they were both gay.”_

_“Penguin wedding? **That’s cute.”**_

_“It was so cute. But enough about how cute it was. Why don't you think my plans are a good idea?”_

_“Good lord. Really? Look, when I was 18, and I became mayor of my hometown, I used every last dollar we had to open a giant winter sports complex, called it Icetown.”_

_“And it turned out great, and everyone loved it.”_

_“Uh, yeah, kind of. It was never completed and I got impeached. Newspaper headline was ‘Icetown Costs Ice Clown His Town Crown.’”_

_“Yuck.”_

_“They were big into rhymes.”_

_“Well, I don’t know, I think Icetown sounds great. And the point is, at least you tried something.”_

**

On the third evening Leslie watches Ben help Donna make dinner and wishes to God that they were at least right about Twinkies. Surely the Twinkies will survive a nuclear apocalypse. She contemplates a world without dessert and shudders.

Ben doesn’t want her to try her plans. He thinks it is too risky to march back to Pawnee and try to wrest control from the inept Mayor Gunderson. They argued about it earlier in the bathroom – the only place in the bunker with any privacy – in hushed voices.

“I’m not going to take over.”

“Like how you didn’t try to take over the budget meetings?” Ben said incredulously.

“They sent people right into the fallout because they didn’t want to accept reality,” Leslie argued, “people like Chris.”

Ben’s mouth thinned and he touched her back, “Chris made his own choice. I don’t agree with it, but he knew the risk he was taking to go help those people.”

It doesn’t sit right with Leslie that Ben isn’t frantic about his partner marching down a highway to certain death. She can’t understand what Chris thought he was doing given what he knew and she’d drilled Ben about whether Chris had really understood the consequences.

“Trust me, Chris knew,” Ben said, almost bitterly, “more than anyone else really.”

It still doesn’t sit right and there is no way she was going to let Gunderson and Dexthart and all the other incompetent people running Pawnee make more mistakes that would cost lives. They ran Pawnee into a debt crisis. What made anyone think they could handle this?

She brought this up to Ben in the bathroom and he’d cupped her face with two hands, leaned in, and become very intent, “It is too risky. Leslie, you can’t know what kind of chaos is down there. Here at Ron’s cabin you’re safe and Grace is safe.”

“But Pawnee is not. I have to go back. We need to go back,” she’d gripped his wrists. It occurred to her then that Pawnee wasn’t Ben’s town. His pleas touched something deep down in her that told her that this thing between them could have become something more if the world hadn’t dropped out beneath them.

“What about Grace?”

“Don’t. Don’t use her against me. I’ll keep her safe. You know my ideas are good,” She leaned forward and their foreheads tip together, “Help me do this.”

“You have no idea how dangerous it is,” he whispered and April knocked on the door and that was the end of their conversation.

Leslie considers if he could be right. Risk management was his job, but she reminds herself he worked with numbers. This isn’t numbers. This is Pawnee and no one knows Pawnee better than Leslie.

She would understand his reticence if he was scared. Almost everyone around them was scared, but Ben wasn’t scared.  
  
He was steady. Solid.  
  
He pointed out flaws in her plan. If they wanted to grow food they’d need to remove at least 18 inches of topsoil. Whatever the rain touched would need to be scrubbed down. If the radiation was bad enough to kill they’d know soon. He never countered Leslie in front of the group. He seemed to understand the importance of hope.

Ben wasn’t scared. Ben knew things and that knowing made him prepared.  
  
In the bathroom he explained to her that people wouldn’t want to share resources. They would hoard and loot and steal. Civilized society unravels much more quickly than we’d like to think, he said. When the rain stopped they needed to think about protection and the best way to stay safe was if no one knew they were even here. Leslie knows Ron agrees with him. She’s seen them consulting maps of Ron’s property and talking about early detection systems.

On their first night in the bunker, April had asked how Ben knew so much stuff. Andy asked if he was some sort of secret nuclear ninja. Ben shrugged and confessed to seeing too many sci-fi movies. But now Leslie sees that as a distraction. It wasn’t a real explanation and she has no idea what the real one would be.

But whatever it was Leslie wasn’t Ben. She wasn’t Ron or anyone else. She was Leslie Knope and she couldn’t just not try.

***

April doesn’t want to think about it. Her parents and sister are dead. There is nothing anyone can do about it so what is the point of thinking about it? People who think thinking about it will help are dumb. Andy croons in her ear about eagles and flying away. She tucks herself into his arms because it helps. The ridiculously happy Mouse Rat songs help too. She doesn’t have to think when Andy sings to her.

He doesn’t ask her to talk about it either and she loves him even more because of that.

  


 

As the rain slows it sinks in what has happened. Before the fallout it had been about survival and what comes next is about survival too, but it isn't the grace to keep your head when everyone else looses theirs.  
  
No, April realizes with each slowing _ping_ of the rain on the roof above them that the world will have changed when they emerge from underground. The categories will have shifted. There won't be lame and not-lame. There will only be smart and alive or stupid and dead. Before time had moved sooooo slowly in Pawnee; nothing ever changed. But now everything has changed in an instant and it will be the people who are left behind. Shift or fail.

April does not want to die.  
  
  
She digs her fingers into Andy's t-shirt and inahles him. He smells like sweat and bubblebath. She is surprised how much she likes it. It is manly and childlike at the same time. His arms tighten around her and he lowers his lips closer to her ear.

 

"5,000 candles blowing in the wind..."

 

April is pretty sure that isn't the song, but hey she doesn't care.

 

In those three days, April decides she doesn't want to die and she doesn't want Andy to die either. She loves him. They've only been together a few weeks, but she loves him. He is her only family now. And she tells him that when her face is pressed into the curve of his neck on the third night.

 

"I love you," she says it when she sure he is asleep, but he isn't. He doesn't say anything except  _awesomesauce_ and normally that would bother her, but the categories have shifted now. She holds his face between her hands and makes him say it again and he does. He meant it before too because her loving him is what makes the sauce so awesome. He explains this and she smiles for the first time since she dreamed of Orin painting the world white.

 

April wants to live. She doesn't want to let this thing, these people, destroy her whole family. So April makes a decision:  she is going to go down into Pawnee with Leslie Knope. Leslie and her ideas are their best hope of survival. See cause April isn't cut of the same cloth as Ron or this Ben guy. She's not going to hide and cower and hope to make it through. April is going to go with Leslie and she is going to help her cause April is mad as hell.

 

Now she just needs to learn how to shoot a gun.

 

**

 

When the rain stops and everyone presses forward out of the basement bunker, Leslie hesitates. Ron is at the front of the crowd with the geiger counter. Ben hangs back, hands stuffed into pockets and waits for Leslie to carry Grace up the stairs.  
  
  
As the rain started to slow he pulled her into the bathroom one last time and begged her not to go into Pawnee, but Leslie was determined and after that a silence fell between them. He hovered near her but there was no connection. He was mad and Leslie wasn't going to change her mind. 

 

The shine of sunlight blinds Leslie as she emerges from the bunker. Trees drip and she is careful to not let the water land on Grace's skin.

 

Ron waves the geiger counter in front of him, "It's safe!" he yells, "The radaition is within a tolerable level."

 

Leslie exhales a long breath. Ben had been right. The storm had come from the east and if the explosion had been in Indianapolis then everything the rain touched in Pawnee would have been contaminated, but the explosion had been further - probably Columbus - and by the time the rain reached Pawnee it was safe.

 

"Now what?" April stands next to Leslie and she seems to say it to Leslie, but Ron answers.

 

"We take stock of our supplies and set-up a perimeter and hunker down."

 

"What about the people in Pawnee? Our families?" Ann says.

 

Ben stands at Leslie's elbow and reaches for Grace, "Ask Leslie. She's the one with the master plan."

 

She doesn't miss his derision and steps away, keeping Grace with her, "We need to go down there. We need to help."

 

"Is it safe?" Tom calls out.

 

"No it is not," this is Ron and Leslie closes her eyes. It is one thing to fight Ben on this, but Ron too...

 

"I'll go," April speaks up, "Men are cowards," she says in an undertone and Leslie smiles.

 

"And I will go to protect you from mutants and racoons," Andy wraps an arm around April's waist.

 

"No, Andy," Ben moves back next to Leslie. He still has his hands stuffed in his pockets like he is bored. He slipped sunglasses on when they emerged from the bunker and now it means she can't read his expression, "I'll go. Too many of us will draw too much attention. You should stay here and help Ron set up a perimeter." 

 

Andy looks at April and she nods. Leslie can feel Ben next to her even though they aren't touching. She inhales and sets her eyes to look somewhere else because she knows there is tension in his arms, that even though he holds himself losely, that it is an act. He thinks this is a very bad idea.

 

**

 

Ben insists they wait till morning to go into Pawnee. It is already afternoon and the sun will be going down in a few hours. They'll take Ron's truck and make their way through the neighboorhoods to City Hall. Ben makes Leslie promise they are just going to gather information.

 

"Let's figure out who is in charge and what kind of state people are in," he says to Leslie and April that evening when they sit down to talk strategy,"We'll spend the night at your house and in the morning then we'll try to help. But we aren't going to tell anyone about Ron's cabin or that everyone is up here."

 

"What about our families?" It is Ann again. She hovers behind Leslie's shoulder, "What if you find them?"

 

Ben looks at everyone grouped in Ron's living room. They hold plates on their knees and eat silently listening. Leslie looks at their faces. Everyone stares at her with wide, frightened eyes except for Ron and Ben. Ron is quiet. His displeasure at their plans radiates off him in waves. He sits errect on a stool and doesn't move except for the occasional twitch of his moustache. For the first time all day Leslie looks Ben in the eye and is grateful to stare back at someone who does not seem to be in shock.

 

Ben turns in his chair to face the whole room, "Everyone should write down the name of family members who might be in Pawnee and where you think we'd most likely find them. We'll make a round tomorrow before we go to City Hall and check it out. We're not going to tell them anything, but when we get back," Ben takes a deep breath, "I'll take anyone who has family down there if you want. I promise."

 

Leslie watches him talk and her eyes settle on the width of his shoulders. He's not a large man, but there is strength in his arms. She's seen him naked and even though he might be wirey he is also muscle. She swallows and bites on her lip. It isn't that she wants him right now. There isn't enough energy in her to want him like that. It is more that she is seeing him for a second time. She is noticing a new set of details. It is the deep timber of his voice, the four-day old shadow darkening his face, and the way he holds himself straight and tall and calm.

 

It makes her think of the way he pushed her up against her door that first night. He had been confident and a little rough. And desperate. The difference between now, sitting at a table with him and April, and then was then he had been desperate. Then his breath hitched and his hands trembled a little. Something about her and them together made him come undone. But this - strategizing in the wake of a nuclear attack - left him cool and collected.

 

"How do you know all this stuff?" That had been April's question when Ben insisted they go armed into Pawnee. He hadn't answered her and Ron's agreement with Ben distracted everyone from noticing. But Leslie had noticed and she counted it as the second time Ben had evaded the question.

 

Leslie was not happy about Ben's insistence they take guns. She pulled him aside and told him, but his only answer had been clipped, "Well then that makes two of us."

 

There was no way to know what kind of chaos they would meet, Ben explained. Gunderson had sent almost every police and firefighter and doctor toward the blast zones. There had been rioting in Eagleton and April and Andy had recounted multiple times their harrowing trip on foot through Pawnee. Leslie was comfortable with guns. She knew how to shoot. But she wasn't comfortable just carrying one around the streets of her own town.

 

April didn't know how to shoot a gun and so the three of them spent the afternoon practicing. Luckily Ron made his own bullets so they were well stocked. Ben had chosen three hand guns for them from Ron's collection. He'd handed Leslie her's but she just handed it back and went to pick out her own. Ron leaned against the door to his gun room with his arms crossed and said nothing. She wasn't sure what bothered him more - her insistence they go to Pawnee or their using his guns.

 

Ben had set up empty soda cans on a fence in the field behind Ron's cabin. Leslie shot five out of the six and opted out of more practice.

 

"Good job," Ben said.

 

"You sound surprised," Leslie handed him her empty gun. She was comfortable with the 9-round semi-automatic. It was overkill, but she wasn't ever going to use it anyway, "I know how to use a gun. My dad hunted."

 

"Fair enough," Ben said to her back as she walked back to where Andy and Ron watched from a distance.

 

April took longer. She was eager to learn, but shooting a gun in real life is different than shooting zombies on Xbox no matter what Andy said. She closed both eyes when she shot and pulled hard on the trigger than she needed. Ben was patient and taught her to just pull lightly on the trigger. He stood behind her and caught her shoulders when the kick back was more than she expected. But April grew more and more frustrated as she failed to hit even a single can.

 

"This is dumb," she kicked the ground, "Why do I need to know how to shoot a can off a fence. A person is like a hundred times the size of a can."

 

"Because accuracy means everything," Ben insisted, "There is a difference between shooting at someone and shooting them. Most people will scare off with a warning shot, but once you shoot them everything changes."

 

"Well then you do it then if you know so much," she handed him her gun.

 

Ben raised his arm, but continued to look at April with the same bored expression he had when they first emerged from the bunker. He fired six shots and Leslie watched the six cans fall in a waterfall. Everyone in the field was silent and there was only the lingering echo of the gunshots as the sun began to sink into the horizon between the trees.

 

Ben looked evenly at Leslie, "Help her practice."

 

And Leslie didn't say anything. Her hand was at her throat.

 

**

 

That night Leslie ignores Ron's silent stares and Ben's quiet presence. Instead, she feeds Grace in the quiet of the beroom she and Ben are supposed to share.

 

Pawnee is like another limb or her child. She has to try to save it just like she had to try to save Grace. The idea that Grace and Pawnee might be in the same category causes her to knock the bottle she’s feeding Grace out and the baby squirms. Leslie frowns.

 

She has a whole stack of plans for Pawnee. She wants to read all the books in Ron's survival library books and even more ideas percolating, but caring for a Grace is out of her element. There are some parts that are easy. Loving Grace is simple enough. It is the softness of her skin and tender blond hair coming in. It is how she looks bright eyed at everyone who holds her. How she is the only person who can tug even a half-smile out of Jerry. She is an easy, affable baby and Leslie’s heart swells at the thought that she gets to hold her in her arms.

 

But she did not plan on Grace and Grace is not her child. Leslie knows it is dangerous to love something that can never be your own. It felt like stealing, to hold Grace and rock her to bed. It feels like Leslie whisked away another woman's happiness and the image of a mother out there looking for her keeps Leslie awake at night. But reality sets in and Leslie knows it is unlikely Grace will ever know who her parents were and even more likely that they are dead. Instead, she is stuck with Leslie.

 

All of it keeps her up at night after Ben has fallen asleep in the bed next to her.

 

When he comes to bed he says nothing except, "The baby asleep?"

 

She pretends to be going over her notes as he strips off his jeans and climbs into bed. He sleeps with socks on, she notes, and hid a little smile behind her notebook. It isn't fair that he could do that with a gun and still sleeps in his socks. He doesn't try to touch her, but turns his back to her and mumbles into his pillow, "Goodnight."

 

"Ben?"

 

"Hmmm?"

 

"Thank you, for doing this when I know you don't want to."

 

There is long silence and Leslie's hand trembles until from the other side of the bed Ben says, "That's what friends are for."

 

And for some reason that hurts more than the silence.

 

So Leslie takes out the note, which is tucked between her plans, and unfolds it.

 

_Go big or go home._

 

It may be foolish to believe that the message applies to her right now in this moment, but Leslie feels like it does. But in this case, going big meant going home. She didn't care if it was foolish because sometimes you just gotta try. It is who you are and if that makes you a fool, to rush into something, to do the thing that is unsafe and unknown, then Leslie must just be the fool. When the world comes down around you the best thing you can do, she thinks, is stay true to yourself.

 

And that applies to Grace too. Taking Grace had been foolish and she didn't know why she had done it. Pawnee was her hometown. Grace was not her baby.

 

The thought that this baby could be permanent is enough to cause Leslie to wish she could have a panic attack. She isn't ready to be a mother and despite her overwhelming, fierce protectiveness over Grace she doesn't know why this baby at this moment. She loves this baby, but she wasn't looking to be a mother. She didn't ask for this and she's not sure she wants it. Leslie wants to cry and scream and unravel but she just doesn't have the energy to do it. It is easier to put one foot in front of the other, to plan, and not think about reality.

 

Leslie has unfolded and refolded the note that was left with Grace so manytimes she is worried the paper will rip in the creases. The pencil markings are beginning to smudge, but Leslie stares at it and cannot turn away. It is a command.  _Go big or go home._

 

**

 

They leave as the sun crests the hills. Ben drives and April sits between them on the bench seat. Leslie leans against the window and lets her gaze follow the path the headlights cut through the trees. She left Grace asleep in her carrier. Ann would watch her, but it didn't feel right to leave her behind again.

 

But Leslie sets her eyes forward now because she cannot think of things like that. Soft things. Of Grace and where her mother might be. She cannot be overcome by emotion. She has to be more like Ben. Her friends need her. Grace needs her. Pawnee needs her.

 

**

 

"This can't be right," Leslie sits forward when they pull into the first neighborhood. April hugs her knees close to her chest, but doesn't bother to tell Leslie what she wants to say.

 

Of course it is right:  the cars abandoned in the middle of the road and windows shattered. It is the belongings: clothes, furniture, and someone's doll strewn across lawns. A street light lies across two lawns and Ben has to drive up onto the sidewalk to avoid running over a bike left in the middle of the street. This is what happens when people panic, April thinks, when they flee and abandon hope and good sense. Of course this is what happens.

 

"Let's just get to Jerry's house," Ben grips the steering wheel. April holds the list everyone made. Jerry wants them to see if they can find Gail or if his daughters have returned from Muncie. Donna wants them to drive past her brother's apartment. Don't stop, she told them, but just see if the idiot is still alive. Tom listed Jean-Ralphio. But that was it. Ann and Andy's families lived in Terre Haute where they'd both gone to high school. Ron wasn't worried about his own family and Leslie is sure Marlene is at City Hall helping with rescue efforts.

 

"But we've got to stop. People might need help -,"

 

"Leslie, we talked about this."

 

April just hugs her knees closer to her chest as they argue over her. She looks and looks at the homes. She grew up in a home like these. She was the girl who lived on a road called Stardust just off Infinity Drive. Her mother used to tell her Neverland -

second star to the right and straight on till morning - was just a block away. April used to hate her house, her parents' cheer annoyed her, and none of it mattered. But now that it all was shattered the absence hurt.

 

From the corner of her vision, April sees something running across a lawn. It takes her a second to realize what it is. It is a dog.

 

"STOP!" She yells and for some reason Ben listens to her. April doesn't wait for the truck to come to a complete stop or for Leslie to slide out. She clambers over Leslie and is out the door and to the dog before either of them can realize what is happening.

 

It is a dog and April realizes when she gets closer that he only has three legs.

 

"Hey buddy..." she kneels in the grass and holds out her palm. The dog whines and she beckons him again and then he takes a tentative lick of her hand. His paws are raw, she realizes, and his fur is matted. She looks around. Ben and Leslie watch from the truck, but there is no one else around. The dog pushes his nose into her shoulder and April makes a decision. She scoops him up.

 

"He's coming with us," she says to Ben through the truck window.

 

Ben sighs, "Fine. Put him in the back and keep him out of the way."

 

"What are you going to call him?" Leslie asks when April gets back into the truck.

 

April pauses. She considers something ironic, but then she remembers she is the girl who lived a block from Neverland. She hears Andy singing Mouserat songs in her head and decides to pick something not ironic.

 

"Champion," she says, "his name is Champion."

 

**

 

There is no one at Jerry's house and Ben doesn't want to linger, but Leslie insists on stopping when she sees the stripe cloth waving in the wind. She runs to the backyard and grabs all of Jerry's shirts drying on clothing line. Gail must have hung them. She recognizes the Hawiaan shirt and the plaids and knows Gail picked them out for Jerry. She gathers them up in her arms and holds onto them all the way to Pioneer Hall.

 

Ben parks three blocks away and they leave Champion in the cab of the truck. Leslie wants to leave her gun, but Ben gives her a look and she slips the holster Ron gave her on under the hoodie she brought with her. The sun is up now and spring is fading. Summer will be here soon, Leslie thinks. She should be putting the final touches on the catalog and working with the Rec teachers on their classes. She should be planning the children's concert and enjoying walks through all of Pawnee's parks before they flood with children. She shouldn't be doing this. But then she remembers the government was going to be shut down anyway.

 

The halls of Pioneer Hall are eerily quiet. The lights are off and Ben presses a finger to his lips. They haven't seen anyone yet this morning. They have seen the pilfered grocery stores and driven over shattered glass where store windows had been broken. Racoons ran through the streets and there was trash all up and down Main. Leslie wonders where all the people are. She wonders if there is anyone left.

 

"Leslie Knope?"

 

It is Councilman Howser. He comes around the corner holding a flashlight and shines it bright in their eyes.

 

"Hey, shine that thing somewhere else...," Ben yells and she sees him reaching for the gun tucked into the band of his jeans, but she puts a hand on his wrist and he stops.

 

"Councilman Howser, where is everyone?" She steps forward.

 

"Where have you been?" he drops the beam of the flashlight and Leslie can see in the dim sunlight coming through the high up windows that he is ragged. He's wearing the same suit and orange vest she saw him in the night of the explosions, but there is blood on the vest and a tear in the knee of his pants. He lost his tie at some point and his head is bandaged.

 

Leslie doens't answer and she can feel Ben exhale when she simply repeats her question.

 

Councilman Howser's shoulder's slump, "Gunderson and Paul Iaresco and Cheif Trumple took the last of our volunteers and almost all of the doctors from St. Joseph's to Indianapolis right before the storm hit. He left me and Carl in charge -,"

 

"Carl Lorthner? From the Parks Rangers?"

 

"Yeah," Councilman Howser rubs his ear, "he left Carl and I in charge but then people began to riot and all we could do was barricade ourselves at St. Joesph's. There were all these rumors about this being a nuclear attack and it scared people."

 

"It was a nuclear attack, " Leslie says, "on multiple cities."

 

His shoulders slump, "I know...I know. We figured that out on the second day of the storm when people started coming back."

 

"Back from where?" Ben asks.

 

"We sent people in all four directions. Gunderson said it was the Pawnee way, but I think it was a mistake," Councilman Howser is shaking his head now. He is crying and Leslie swallows hard. She doens't know if he even remembers they are standing there. He continues talking, but it tumbles out in pitiful gasps, "We sent them right into the fallout. The only ones to return came from Indianapolis. They came back but Dr. Harris can only do so much. It was terrible, Leslie. Just terrible."

 

"What was?"

 

"The radiation sickness. The drivers were barely concious when they drove the trucks to St. Joseph's. All of them were covered in their own vomit and they kept going in an out of conciousness. The worst were covered in burns and losing their hair, but most of them just looked like they had the flu. We filled the beds and washed them down. Gave them iodide and tried to keep them hydrated, but it was just too late."

 

"How many?" Ben asks, "How many came back?"

 

"A few dozen," Councilman Howser says and looks at Leslie, "I'm sorry Leslie. We tried."

 

She's not sure why he is apoligizing to her until he keeps talking, "We tried to save them. Your mom and them, but Dr. Harris says there isn't anything we can do."

 

**

 

Ben holds onto to her until she steps into the room where Marlene Griggs-Knope is dying. Then he lets her go and shuts the door and Leslie is alone.

 

Her mother's hair is falling out. In clumps. It lies on the pillow and Leslie touches three fingers to her breast bone. Her mother had never been a vain woman. She believed intelligence and hard work were far more important than looks, but she had always loved her hair. She loved to dye it and nothing made her feel like a new woman like a new hair cut. She had loved her hair.

 

"Leslie?"

 

"Mama, I'm here," Leslie sinks down into the chair next to her mother's hospital bed. There isn't a monitor keeping her vitals or a nurse hovering in the background. There is only the silent drip of morphine. No one even bothered to turn the lights on. The hospital generator won't last forever, Leslie thinks. Better to conserve the energy. But still it bothers her.

 

"You're here. No one knew where you were."

 

"I'm here now." She laces her fingers with her mother's, "Right here. With you."

 

"You were always going off places," Marlene opens her eyes. They are watery and tired, "You were always strongest when you were on your own."

 

"Shhhh," Leslie leans over and brushes her fingers through what is left of her mother's hair, "you don't need to talk."

 

"I want to say this," Marlene shifts, "You are strong, Leslie."

 

Leslie doesn't feel strong. She is tired and scared. She doesn't know if she can do this.

 

Marlene shifts against the pillow and tries to raise her head, "I tried to go and help. It seemed like the right thing to do."

 

"It was, Mama," Leslie smiles. It had been foolish, she realizes, but the right thing anyway. It was what Griggs women did.

 

"You'll help too and you'll be alright. I always knew you would be."

 

"You did?"

 

"Of course."

 

"But you always seemed a little embarressed by me. Like I was too enthusiastic. Too niave."

 

"Sometimes you were, but you never embarressed me. You just reminded me of your father. He always had so much energy. He was so positive. Like sunshine."

 

Leslie rests her head next to her mother's arm and after a moment she feels her mother's hand in her hair. And she realizes this is the last time she will get to be a child. This is the last time a parent will embrace her, hold her, and tell her everything will be okay. So she doesn't move. She just rests and savors this last time.

 

**

 

"I found a little girl," Leslie says sometime later. She doens't know how much time has passed. It is hard to tell with the lights off and the curtains drawn, "She'd been abandoned and after the attacks I took her with me. I named her Grace."

 

"I like that name," Marlene stirs, "I always wanted more girls, but I just ran out of time."

 

Leslie bites her lip, "How did you know to be a mom?"

 

It takes Marlene longer to respond, "There isn't a secret. You just figure it out. You love them and figure it out."

 

More time passes and Leslie watches her mother sleep. She counts the number of breaths Marlene takes and tries to breathe alongside her. Wishes she could push air into her lungs. She holds the bucket when her mother is sick and looks at Dr. Harris when he comes in to take Marlene's vitals. He motions for Leslie to step into the hall, but Leslie shakes her head. She gets it. It'll be soon.

 

In her head Leslie makes lists of things she should ask her mother. Snatches of wisdom she wants to hoard greedily. She flips through the memories, the stories, she wishes they could reminisce about, but she knows Marlene doens't have the energy. So Leslie does it for her. She carries on the last conversation she wishes she could have with her mother. She plays both parts and lectures herself on the importance of looking people in the eye, in never giving up, and making sure to always wear a blazer. She doesn't eat or notice that the sun and moon switch places. She simply sits and silently talks to her mom the way she wished she had for whole life.

 

"Leslie," Marlene breathes her name later, "you know I love you."

 

"I do Mama, so much," Leslie slides a hip onto the hosptial bed, "I've always known you love me. You taught me how to be me. How to dream big and -,"

 

"That one came from  your father," Marlene coughs and Leslie presses a wash cloth to her mother's mouth to clean her up, "He was the one who convinced me to step outside the classroom. Kept telling me I had something more to give. Go big or go home, he'd always say."

 

Leslie's draws a sharp breath, thinks of the note in her pocket, but says nothing. It can wait.

 

"But it was you who showed me Mama," Leslie forces herself to smile, "it was always you."

 

**

 

Marlene Griggs-Knope dies sometime in the night. Leslie emerges from the hospital room looking like a zombie. Ben catches her by the waist. Dr. Harris slips past them into the room and closes the door, but Ben's only concern is Leslie. He gathers her in his arms and holds her while she leans into his chest.

 

"I'm so sorry Leslie," he rubs large circles on her back. April comes around the corner, bottles of water in hand, and stops. She hovers near them and when Leslie hears her approach she lets go of Ben and steps into April's unsure embrace.

 

Ben lets her go and bites down hard on his lip. He holds himself still, hands on his hips, and tries to figure out what to do. April awkwardly holds onto Leslie who isn't crying but is steeped more by exhaustion than grief at this point. Around them the skeleton staff of St. Joseph's moves in the background. Dr. Harris comes out of the room and notes something on Marlene's chart. He jerks his head to the side and Ben follows.

 

"We've been moving the bodies to the morgue, but we're running out of room. It's too dangerous to bury them in the ground, what with the radiation, so we're going to have to cremate them," he looks toward Leslie, "Do you know if Mrs. Griggs-Knope wanted to be cremated?"

 

"I-I don't know," Ben wants to explain:  he just got here. He isn't even supposed to be here. If it weren't for Leslie Knope he would have done what Chris did. He would have pieced it together much sooner.

 

It is the note that did it. The note was the puzzle piece that gave Ben his hunch and then his guilt. Leslie asked him to take a picture of the note the day before the rain stopped, right before they had their fight in the bathroom, right before the distance between them grew. She had unfolded it and refolded it so many times that the paper had worn thin. She stuttered when she asked, but taking a picture felt like it might preserve some evidence of who left Grace and so she asked him to do it.

 

Ben took the picture with his iphone and when he looked at it something dead struck him in the pit of his stomach. He recognized the shaky handwriting. Later, in a corner of the bunker, he found the file on his phone. It was from twenty years ago - a note between partners - and he isn't sure what it means, but it tells him that the men he and Chris had tracked to Pawnee had in fact shown up. He isn't sure which of them belonged to the handwriting, but it placed them here just days before a nuclear attack on the country.

 

But just as soon as the thrill of discovery appeared dread sunk in. They had left Grace – and Ben has no idea how she fits in – with Leslie. Leslie is a target or a connection to one of them and that made her both incredibly valuable and dangerous at the same time. Ben couldn't believe his fate or sheer dumb luck, but very quickly he realized that the safest thing to do was to keep Leslie and Grace hidden away at Ron's cabin. That was why he tried to talk her out of going to Pawnee. It was the best way to keep her safe. But she is Leslie Knope and Ben had to settle for the second best thing:  staying close by her side. 

 

But Ben knew all of this was larger than Leslie Knope. He had slipped away in the hours while Leslie sat vigil. He went to City Hall and picked the lock on the security guard's office. He found the footage they kept of the single security camera on the front entrance and he checked the log. Chris had signed his name the day Grace had been abadnoned. He had thought it odd:   the appearence of a baby and followed the hunch to the footage. Ben knew before he watched it what would be on there: the haggered face of Harvey Grist. The face of the man Ben had been hunting for two years. The man Chris traveled into the fallout to find.

 

"I don't know," Ben stammers now to Dr. Harris, "I don't know what to do."

 

**

 

In the end they go back to Ron's. Leslie doesn't want to stay at the hospital and there isn't anything else they can do. She just keeps repeating Ann's name and so Ben takes her to Ann.

 

April holds Leslie, who says nothing but, "Ann. I want Ann. Where is Ann?" 

 

And Ben drives the back roads. He is knows it is idiotic to travel at night. And if he wasn't worried about Leslie, afraid that she might go cataonic, he would have insisted they stay at St. Joseph's and wait till morning. But when he held her face in his hands she gripped his wrists and asked him to take her to Ann. She didn't cry or scream. She just wanted her best friend, the last of her family she said. She mentioned Grace. Grace was with Ann. If she got to Ann she could hold Grace. So he threw caution to the wind and took her to Ann.

 

After Gunderson had led the last remnant of real authority out of Pawnee citizens rioted in the rain. There was a run on gas and

and food and medical supplies. And on the third day people began to flee. There was panic and people had given up the idea that this had been a military accident or plant explosion. The Newports told everyone who worked for Sweetums the factory was closing indefinitely and the family disappeared out of town. Said they were sure Pawnee would be next and people believed them. People teemed on the highways and headed west, south, and north. Anywhere to get out of the wake of the storm and whatever came next. There was no way to know, Councilman Howser said, how many people were left in Pawnee, but out of the 70,000 he guessed there wasn't more than a few thousand who remained. And those few thousand remained huddled in their homes with no news, no plan, and nothing but fear to keep them company.

 

So Ben keeps his foot on the gas, tells himself not to slow down no matter what, and barrels toward Ron's cabin. When they take the dirt path that leads back into the valley where the cabin is hidden Ben turns off the headlights. He navigates the trail and doesn't pay April any attention when she wonders out loud if he has gone insane.

 

"Dude, slow down. You are going to hit a tree," she complains.

 

"I know what I'm doing April," Ben doesn't take his eyes off the path, but he does ease off the gas a little.

 

"Where did you learn all this stuff?" It is the third time she has asked him and Ben knows she's just going to keep asking him. People underestimate her, he thinks.

 

"I was a boy scout."

 

She snorts and looks at Leslie who has finally fallen asleep with her head in April's lap, "I know you snuck off somewhere earlier."

 

"Went for a walk."

 

"You have a secret and eventually you're going to tell me."

 

"Why?"

 

"Cause I think you're more than a state audtior."

 

"Nope, that's it. Just a numbers robot."

 

April stops looking at him and scratches Champion, who lies in a ball at her feet, "A numbers robot who knows about nuclear explosions and is a badass with a gun."

 

Ben doesn't say anything and April waits him out. Finally he asks, "Why do you care?"

 

"Cause," she says, "I want to help.

 

**

 

Leslie is so exhausted and broken by the time they get to Ron's cabin that Ben picks her up under her knees and carries her inside. There is commotion when Donna opens the door. Champion starts barking and everyone is yelling, but Ben carries Leslie straight back to the bedroom they shared. He lays her on the bed and steps back so Ann can hover over her.

 

"Her mom died. Radiation poisoning," Ben says to Ann and Ron who shuts the door behind him, "She sat with her for almost twelve hours and I think she's in some sort of shock. But she just kept asking for you Ann so I brought her home."

 

"It's probbaly just exhaustion and shock," Ann stands up. She touches Ron on the arm, "Can you go get one of those sleeping pills I've been giving to Jerry?" She turns to Ben, "We'll let her sleep and in the morning we'll make her eat a real meal," she leads him out of the bedroom and waits until the door is closed behind her, "You did good, Ben. You were right to bring her back. If she'd stayed she'd only have pushed herself further."

 

Ben touches his forehead, "Where's Grace?"

 

"Andy was feeding her. You should go and take care of her. It's what Leslie would want."

 

Ben's not sure Leslie would want. Ever since he had recognized the handwriting on the note he held a breath hoping that the connection between Harvey Grist and Leslie Knope wasn't real, but then there it had been in black and white on the video. He recognized the man just from the gait of walk. Chris had too and he had headed to almost certain death on the chance of finding him in Indianapolis. It is what Ben should have done and maybe what he should do now except there is the fact that Leslie and Grace meant something to Harvey. There is the chance the man might be coming back for them and that means Ben is going to stay right where he is. But Ben hopes that Harvey Grist doesn't mean anything to Leslie because if Harvey shows up Ben is going to have to kill him.

 

**

 

Ron watches Ann take care of Leslie. He hovers in the background, brings her what she asks for, and insists she eat when she doens't ask for food for herself. She is there when Leslie wakes up in the morning and she is the one to hold Leslie as she cries. Everyone hears Leslie's sobs. They echo through the closed door of the bedroom and everyone but Ron and Ben flee outside to escape it.

 

Ben holds Grace tight to his chest and she proves herself to be the most excellent speciman of a baby. She does not cry. She remains quiet and still as if she gets that this is a somber moment. She reaches for Ben's finger when he holds it in front of her face and Ron tries not to let his moustache twitch. Neither man says anything as Leslie's grief fills the cabin. Ben studies Grace and Ron studies Ben.

 

The man is in love with Leslie and possibly Grace too. Ron sees the way his throat tightens when Leslie's cries quiet through the door. He is as close to her as he is allowed to be. She hasn't asked for him. They don't have that type of relationship, but Ron can see that Ben wishes they did. He wants to be the one holding her. He wants to comfort her and fix it. He does the second best thing. He cares for Grace. Ron found them this morning on the couch, Grace curled on Ben's chest and a bottle still in his hand. Ben is the one to feed her and change her and won't let anyone else hold her. And when Ann slips from the room to get Leslie a drink of water or another sleeping pill to try to calm her down, Ben hovers near the door's edge to ask for an update.

 

But grief isn't like sickness. It cannot be cured. There is only endurance and Ron knows Leslie will be alright. She will rally, but Ben doesn't know Leslie like the rest of them do and so he is ghostly white. He starts to ask Ron if he thinks she'll be okay. Will she smile again? What about her plans for Pawnee? Will she be able to see them through? He starts to ask, but he can't finish the sentences.

 

At twilight, Ron finally asks, "Special forces or CIA?"

 

Ben jerks his head up, but stares evenly at Ron. He shifts Grace in his arms, "Neither, FBI."

 

Ron mulls this over and Ben waits him out, "Do you know what is going on?"

 

"Might."

 

"Does it have to do with Leslie and the baby? Are my friends in danger?"

 

"Maybe."

 

Ron is tempted to pick the man up by the scruff of the neck and throw him out of the cabin, but then he remembers that Ben is in love with Leslie Knope. He may not know it yet himself, but the man is acting on that love. It is why he clutches a stolen baby in his arms and leans against the door while Leslie grieves on the other side when he is trained to hunt a man down. When Ron suspects his partner has already started the job.

 

"What gave me away?" Ben finally asks.

 

"You wouldn't answer April's questions."

 

Ben smiles and looks down at Grace, "Do you want me to go?"

Ron blusters, "Way I figure that's up to Leslie. You're here because of her. There's no way to say if we're safer with you here or gone."

"You're safer if I'm here," He says it as if it were fact and Ron believes it is probably true.

"Well then," Ron sits forward, "I guess you'll just have to tell Leslie. Let it be her decision."

Ben's cheek twitches. Ron knows these types of men. They deal in secrets and lies. Ben made a calculated move confessing to him truthfully. In his mind there had to be an advantage to Ron knowing his secret, but the man is in love with Leslie and he is worried that if she knows the truth she will make him leave. With Leslie it isn't about strategy and secrets. For her, Ben Wyatt is ready to be made the fool.

And Ron envies him. He envies the man whose heart has been claimed by a woman. He thought he'd had it once, twice, but it had been a ruse. When love is true and good your heart isn't some prize. The object of your affection doesn't toy with it and seek to control you. When love is real the other person cherishes you. And Ben Wyatt is ready to give his heart to Leslie Knope. Ron can see that plain as day. The question is whether Leslie would love him back.

Ben says in a low voice, "Guess we'll see then."

***

“What are you doing?” April hovers in the doorway.

  


Ben tugs the last zipper shut on his backpack, slings it over his shoulder, and stands up, “Don’t worry about it.”

 

  
“I’m won’t.”

 

  
“Good,” he glances past her into the living room. Ann rocks Grace in her arms. Ben swallows. It’s been three days since he brought Leslie back from Pawnee. Three days since she sat vigil as her mother died of radiation exposure. And in that time he’s done nothing but wait. Hover on the edge of her existence. Other people have kept a closer orbit:  Ann mostly, but also Ron and April and even Donna take turns sitting with Leslie.

 

  
But Ben has kept his distance. He doesn't know why exactly....no that is a lie. He knows exactly why he has kept a distance and it has everything to do with the secrets he keeps. So Ben has had nothing to do but wait and keep Grace close. He’s cared for Grace, held her, soothed her, fed her, and changed her. He has waited and waited and waited. And he’ll wait longer, but he can’t stay in the house any more. He can’t do nothing but wait. Grace will be safe with Ann and Ann and the rest of them will be safe with Ron. Even if it is just for a few hours.

 

  
“Keep an eye out,” Ben tells April and turns to leave, but her voice makes him stop.

 

  
“Ron told me.”

 

  
Ben feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He looks at the girl. She is so small, but then she looks at him with that deadpan stare and Ben knows not to underestimate her. He turns, looks over his shoulder, and she hasn’t moved from her spot in the doorway and an idea forms in his head. She could be useful. She wants to be helpful. She hugs her arms to her stomach and Ben notices she has a backpack too.

 

  
“Come on,” he jerks his head, “let’s go.”

 

  
**

 

  
“This is dumb,” April finally speaks an hour later. Ben is impressed by how long it took her to say something. She isn’t silent. She doesn’t know how to move her feet over the forest floor, how to keep from snapping branches and leaving a clear trail in her wake, but at least she doesn’t suffer from the youthful tendency to talk just to fill the space.

 

  
“Why’s that?” Ben slows. They are on the crest of a hill and he can hear the creek that Ron said marked the edge of his property.

 

  
“I thought we’d be doing, you know, stuff,” She kicks a small rock and it rolls down the hill with a  _clunk, clunk, clunk_. Ben watches it and draws his eyebrows together.

 

  
“What kind of stuff?”

 

  
“Super secret agent stuff. Like when you shot those cans.”

 

  
“And why do you want to do super secret agent stuff?”

 

  
“Cause.”

 

  
Ben waits for the answer.

 

  
“I don’t want to die,” her eyes flash at him, “I don’t want Andy to die. Or Champion.”

 

  
Slowly, Ben nods. He shrugs off his backpack and pulls out a set of binoculars and hands them to April, “Point these south and tell me what you see.”

 

  
April just holds them and smirks, “Are we bird watching?”

 

  
“Look south and tell me what you see.”

 

  
She sets her jaw, “I don’t know which way is south.”

 

  
Ben takes a step closer, “First super secret agent lesson:  always know your surroundings.  _Always._ ” He grabs her hand and points it at the sun which shines down on the back of their necks, “It is almost mid-day so it is almost directly above us, but not quite which means that,” he points her hand one way, “is east and all you have to remember is to  _never eat shredded wheat_.”

 

  
“What?”

 

  
“North, East, South, West. Never eat shredded wheat,” He moves both of them in a complete circle, “So if east is that way, then south is…”

 

  
“That way.”

 

  
“Good. Now tell me what you see.”

 

  
Ben stuffs his hands in his jean pockets as April presses her eyes to the binoculars. She is small, but that will mean people will underestimate her. He’s been weighing his options for the past three days, since Ron gave him his ultimatum.

 

  
The simplest option is always the truth. But that requires Ben to trust that Leslie will choose to trust him and that isn’t easy for him to do. Putting faith in other people is not his strength. That was Chris’ job. He was the heart of their team, while Ben was comfortably the brain. He was the one who saw the patterns, who did strategy, and did the heavy lifting of investigating. Chris excelled at people. So the fact that Chris saw the connection between Grace, Leslie, and Harvey Grist is troubling. It means…

 

  
Ben knows what it means and that is why the whole truth is not an option. Because Ben wants to tell her too badly. He wants to trust her. He wants her to put her faith in him. And the last time he wanted something that badly had been Ice Town and that had sealed his fate. Then he’d thrown caution to the wind, gone with his gut, and he’d ended up in the FBI for his troubles.

 

  
No, there was even more at stake here. Lives. Possibly Leslie’s life and Grace’s too. Definitely anyone connected to them. Too much at stake for the whole truth.

 

  
“There are trees and a creek and more stupid trees,” April says.

 

  
“Look again,” Ben stands next to her and guides the binoculars, “down by the creek there is an embankment. Perfect place to bed down and hide. And over there, those trees would be a good place to scout out the whole creek bed. And here on this hill,” Ben steps back, “here is the worst place to be if you don’t want to be seen.”

 

  
“Always know your surroundings,” she says softly.

 

  
Ben steps so they are face to face, “I was hunting someone. Chris and I came to Pawnee because we thought he'd show up.”

 

  
“And he is the one who dropped Grace with Leslie.”

 

  
“Yes and it wasn’t a coincidence it was just two days before the bombs went off.”

 

  
“Did he blow up my family?” Her voice doesn’t waver and her eyes never leave Ben’s, “And all those other people. Is he the reason Leslie’s mom died?”

 

  
Ben hesitates, “I don’t know. He’s ex-CIA, but he went rogue sometime ago and we suspected he had dealings with international arms dealers.”

 

  
“You think he’ll come after Grace and Leslie?”

 

  
“I know he will,” Ben looks around, “That’s why I’m out here. Scouting out the land. I think he left Grace here because he knew Leslie would protect her. He left her here and he’s going to be coming back for her. It is just a matter of time.”

 

  
April looks south, chews on her lip, and Ben holds his breath. April is smart. Maybe not as smart as Leslie, but Ben knows trying the partial truth out on her is his only practice run. If April believes him and doesn’t ask any more questions, questions he’s not ready to answer, then maybe there is a chance Leslie won’t either.

 

  
“What’s the second rule?”

 

  
“What?”

 

  
“If the first rule of super secret agent camp is know your surroundings, what is the second rule?”

 

  
And Ben smiles. Not only did this version of the truth work, but he just recruited an ally. He rubs his jaw, “The second rule is always have a plan.”

 

  
**

 

  
When Leslie is ready to get out of bed the cabin is silent. The sun is low in the sky and she isn't even sure how much time has passed since Ben brought her back to Ann. She blinks and wonders where he is, where Grace is. It occurs to her that she hasn't seen them and the hollow feeling that realization leaves in her stomach is disconcerting.

 

  
She slips out from the quilt and realizes she isn't wearing pants. She wonders who took them off and pats the other side of the bed. It is neat and the pillow cold. It is obvious Ben hasn't slept here. Clad in just a t-shirt and her underwear, Leslie searches for something to put on. Because of Grace she and Ben got the coveted bedroom attached to the bathroom. She digs in the dressers and finds clothes she vaguely remembers putting into drawers before going to Pawnee. She chooses a pair of jeans and an old Harvest Festival t-shirt, comfortably worn thin.

 

  
She pulls the t-shirt to her face and breathes it in. It doesn't smell like anything but her laundry detergent, but she pretends the fabric is new and starched and her parents sport matching ones. She remembers the three of them on the Ferris wheel and her mom arguing with her father when he let Leslie have a third cloud of cotton candy. She holds the t-shirt out and wonders if this was originally hers or if she stole it from her parents. She honestly can't remember and tears prick her eyes when she realizes how her life and their lives melded together, one became the other and the other became hers until there was no way to remember the correct history of this t-shirt. It belonged to all of them.

 

  
But she pushes the well of grief away. She has given herself time to mourn and now it is time to go back to living. So Leslie forces a deep breath and goes to take a shower.

 

  
She is alright until she tries to shave her legs. Her hands tremble then and she cuts herself and as the blood trickles and dilutes with the shower water, Leslie curls into a ball at the bottom of the bath. She knocks the shampoo bottles down and takes deep, shuddering breaths. She counts backwards by sevens, thinks of warm brownies, and tries to give herself a pep talk, but it doesn't work.

 

  
This is going to be harder than she thought. Grief doesn't fit into her plans. She has no time for it. But it isn't just grief for her mother. It is grief and anger and pain about  _all of it._ The space where air should be in her lungs right now, that space is fury. Real and true fury that makes Leslie want to hit something. She wants to scream and scream into the ether until someone tells her why the world can be like this. Why is it possible for the sky to burn and families to be shredded? She thinks of Jerry's smoke smudged face when he told her about Gail and the picture of April leaning on Ron the night the world collapsed. Even the most jaded among them had been broken.

 

  
What was Leslie - Leslie who was sugar and sunshine and smiles - supposed to do?

 

  
For some odd reason she thinks of the random fact she learned probably in science class, but maybe somewhere else too: to kill a fire you must suffocate it. Remove the air and the fire dies. But, you need air, Leslie thinks. She couldn’t just suffocate the anger and hate that burned in her chest. She needs that breath, the same one that fuels this foreign fury.

 

  
Really, her only choice in the wake of such reality, such suffering, is to endure. Leslie sees that as her only choice because she has no where else to go. She has to get up off the floor of this bathtub and she can't return to a world where all things are possible because that world doesn't exist anymore. She'll have to find her dreams in this world now.

 

  
The shower sprays over her and it makes her think that the last time she took a shower it had been with Ben. He had held her and touched her and done things that made it possible to forget. She wonders if it would work again. She wonders where he is and why she has no memory of him in the last few days.

 

  
"Leslie?" Ann knocks on the bathroom door, "Leslie are you okay?"

 

  
"Yeah," Leslie shouts over the spray.

 

  
"I don't believe you."

 

  
"I'll be out in a minute."

 

  
"One minute. That's all you get before I'm fishing you out myself."

 

  
Drained, Leslie finishes her shower and gets dressed, but forgoes the Harvest Festival t-shirt and finds a different one. Ann waits outside the bedroom door with a grim smile on her face, "Are you sure you're alright?"

 

  
"Yeah, I'm fine." Leslie lies. Endurance, she decides, means remembering that suffering is not easily fixed, that fury cannot be quickly quenched, and it is a triumph to follow Ann, to get up off the bottom of that shower, and find her baby.

 

  
**

 

  
Ron's cabin sits in a clearing with sprite green grass and sunshine. The cabin itself is set back against the woods with a tin roof and wide front porch. The furniture is handmade and there are few decorations except the occasional stuffed animal hung on the wall. It is sparse and unaffected. It is Ron. But now the cabin swells with all of them. Donna has taken over a chair by the fire place and a stack of fashion magazines sit on it alongside leopard print slippers. Tom's cashmere scarf is draped over the back of the wood frame, plaid couch and Leslie recognizes the scent of Ann's amazing chocolate chip cookies baking in the oven. The shirts Leslie rescued from Jerry's clothes line, the ones Gail had given him, wave to her from outside where they dry on a makeshift clothesline strung between two trees. Leslie guesses Ann washed them for him.

 

  
On the porch, Ron raises an eyebrow at her as he dresses some animal - a turkey maybe - that he must have shot earlier. They don't need to say anything. Leslie can read it in the twitch of his mustache. He's glad she is up.

 

  
Beyond the shadow of the house, in the field, there is an argument brewing.

 

  
"Those idiots," Ann mumbles and quickens her pace.

 

  
"What are they doing?"

 

  
"We're digging a garden. It'll help supplement our food stores."

 

  
"That's a good idea. Who thought of it?"

 

  
Ann stops, "It was your idea. We took a look at your notes for Pawnee," she flushes, "we figured we could try a few things out on a smaller level, you know, to work out the problems ahead of time."

 

  
Something warm tugs on Leslie's heart, "What are you planting?"

 

  
Ann's smile grows, "Come and see..."

 

  
Besides boxes of Nutriyum bars, the supplies Leslie had gathered from her house had included her seed box. It is mid-April and they can still plant the cool-season vegetables like brocooli, carrots, onions, peas, and asparagus. Ann explains they found a 'Gardening in Southern Indiana' book in Ron's survival library and were following it to the letter. She points out the compost bin she had Ron build them a few days ago and how Tom, Donna, Andy, and Jerry have been turning over the soil. Ron is almost finished with the fence to keep deer and rabbits out and then they are going to start planting. It is the perfect time for sweet corn, Ann explains, and Ben and April are out scouting the land and promised to bring back any strawberry or blackberry bushes they find so they can be transplanted. Ron says he thinks there are some by the creek.

 

  
The arguement, it seems, is between Tom and everyone else who insist he actually touch the dirt rather than simply 'supervise.' Leslie wanders away as Ann tries to convince Tom that the single pair of work gloves Ron had will not chaff his hands. Champion lies on a blanket nearby keeping watch over Grace who is shaded in her carrier by a pice of canvas that someone (likely Ron) jerry-rigged into a pup tent. She kicks her feet and gurgles as Leslie kneels down on the blanket. Her blue eyes dance, she coos, and when Leslie tucks her into the curve of her elbow the smallest of the cracks in her heart begins to mend.

 

  
There is nothing in Ron's survival library about raising a baby. Leslie is without the things that would make her feel competant to do this:  the research, time to prepare, and the plan. Instead, Grace will have to be a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants experience. She came on sudden, like a storm, but with her there is no grief. Leslie thinks of Ben and realizes he happened similarily:  quick, unexpected, and without qualification. Neither of them fit into a Master Plan. Neither fit into any normal parameters. Grace isn't her daughter, but at the same time could be somehow, maybe? Ben is her friend, but also a lover. If the world had stayed sane then maybe they could have been more, but now the rules are different. Normal doesn't exist.

 

  
Did courthship exist anymore? What made up a family now?

 

  
The hospital guessed Grace was six months old. Leslie doesn't know what she should expect. Grace can sit up. She smiles. She isn't teething. She is sensitive, Leslie thinks, aware of her surroundings. She is gentle with Jerry and playful with Andy. She gets people. She is bright and happy. Like sunshine. Leslie knows these things as well as she knows the softness of Grace's skin and the way she has a single curl that falls across her forehead. But if something were to go wrong, Leslie wouldn't know how to even recognize that fact. What she doesn't know and its looming quality scare her.

 

  
"I think she's going to start crawling," Ann sinks down onto the blanket next to Leslie. Tom has been banished to help Ron gut trout and as his protests echo across the field everyone else is happy. Ann pets Champion absently.

 

  
"What?" Leslie asks.

 

  
"She raised herself up onto her hands and knees last night. Took all of us by surprise. Andy tried to get her to crawl to him, but she surprised herself and started to cry. Didn't know how to get back to her stomach."

 

  
"And I missed it."

 

  
"Leslie it was one moment. There will be a hundred more. "Ann doesn't say anything else and Leslie focuses on Grace who yawns and stretches in her arms. She rocks the baby back and forth and after a few minutes the baby sleeps lightly, drool pooling on Leslie's arm, "So you're going to keep her." Ann ducks her head when she says it, becomes intent on scratching behind Champion's ears.

 

  
"You don't think I should?"

 

  
"She has a mother. And a father."

 

  
"Who left her."

 

  
"Are you sure they did willingly?"

 

  
Leslie narrows her eyes, "What are you talking about?"

 

  
There is a sigh and Ann picks herself back up, "I need to go help with the garden, but Leslie you need to talk to Ben when he gets back."

 

  
**

 

  
Leslie waits patiently while Ron shows her the solar panals on the roof, explains the land mines buried around the perimeter of the property, and points out the closet full of guns. He tells her there is no safer place for her and Grace to be than this cabin. They have enough food for months, more if they hunt and the garden works out. Ann has already set up a work chart.

 

  
"She's capable like that," he says. Everyone takes turns doing laundry in the creek, cooking, and playing with Grace. They are going to run out of diapers soon and formula, but Ron is pretty handy with a needle. He thinks he can make some sort of cloth diaper out of canvas and Ann tells him Grace could start eating pureed food soon. He and Ben are going to work on finding some sort of milk source for her.

 

  
"You don't have to go," he crosses his arms at the end of his tour. They are standing alone on the front porch.

 

  
"What does Ben know about Grace?"

 

  
He exhales, "Ann talked to you."

 

  
"All she said was Ben knew something. What is going on Ron?"

 

  
"That is for Ben to explain," Ron moves off the porch and Leslie stalks after him. Pine needles crunch under their feet and Ron doesn't stop until they are out of earshot of the cabin.

 

  
"No, You're going to tell me."

 

  
"It's not my business."

 

  
"Yes it is. If you don't know notice we're all up in each other's business now."

 

  
"I know."

 

  
"So tell me."

 

  
"Leslie," Ron says, "trust me. You want to hear it from him. And give him a chance to tell you all of it before you react."

 

  
Leslie hugs her elbows to her stomach, she trembles, and her voice catches in her throat, "I don't know how much more I can take. I need to be sure of my friends because I'm not sure of anything else right now. Can I be sure of him?"

 

  
"That's up to you."

 

  
"Are you?"

 

  
There is a quiet pause. Ron tucks his hands into his jean pockets and looks at the ground, "Yeah, I think I am."

 

  
**

 

  
The cabin glows like an ember when Ben and April return. The woods is filled with a purple hazy light. Ben can smell fresh dirt and the lingering hint of something roasted. The remnants of Ron's hunting trip cools on the spit over the firepit behind the cabin. They move in silence - April is practicing what Ben taught her this afternoon about staying silent in the woods - and when they reach the front porch the echoes the song reach them. 

 

_Come gather 'round people_

_Wherever you roam_

_And admit that the waters_

_Around you have grown_

_And accept it that soon_

_You'll be drenched to the bone_

_If your time to you_

_Is worth savin'_

_Then you better start swimmin'_

_Or you'll sink like a stone_

_For the times they are a-changin'._

 

  
Ben recognizes the song and April smiles as Andy sings low and long. Through the window they can see everyone gathered in the living room. Donna is in her chair and Ron sits on the hearth, joining Andy with a harmonica in between the verses. Ann sits in an armchair with her legs hitched up over the side. Jerry stares into the fire that burns small and mostly forgotten. Champion lies across his feet and Tom is stretched out on the couch, his cashmere scarf fisted in his hands.

 

  
And then Ben notices Leslie. She is tucked between Ann and Ron and she holds Grace asleep on her chest. Ben licks his lips. Her hair is pulled off her face and she's wearing one of his plaid button downs over a t-shirt against the lingering chill. He doubts she realizes it is his.

 

  
"Let's go," he says more to himself than April.

 

  
**

 

  
“We need to talk,” Leslie’s voice breaks the song when Ben appears in the doorway. April is over his shoulder and Leslie wonders if she knows whatever terrible truth he is hiding. She guesses she does because nothing gets past April.

 

  
Ben clenches his jaw and nods. He knew this was coming. Champion whines, but everyone else stays silent. Leslie stands and Ann reaches out to take Grace, but Leslie shakes her head. The baby sleeps soundly in her arms and it is a good weight. She wants the weight of Grace with her as she faces Ben. Grace will ground her.

 

  
April steps aside so Leslie can pass. Ben drops his pack and by the door and fishes out a flashlight. She wonders how long this will take. How complicated the truth will be.

 

  
Leslie follows him into the field, away from the house, and just into the edge of the forest where they are shadowed by trees. In the nook of a grove of pines, Ben stops and turns. He tucks his hands into his jeans and looks at his feet. Leslie chews her bottom lip. Almost every moment since she's known Ben Wyatt he has appeared cool, calm, and collected. But not know. Now he swallows hard and kicks at the ground with his boots. He takes his hands out of his pockets, wrings them together, and Leslie sees that they tremble. The only time she's seen that happen was before he touched that first time, in the moments right before he kissed her or she kissed him. She can't remember which it was.

 

  
"I think I know who left Grace." He blurts it out and then he looks at her and the nervousness isn't just in his hands. It is in his whole face. He looks pained.

 

  
"How....how could you know?"

 

  
"I reviewed the security tape and I recognized the guy. When we were at the hospital." 

 

  
He means while her mother was dying he slinked away to look at a video. But then she remembers she never asked anything of him and when she had come out he had been there. The anger bubbling up now isn't because he snuck away. It is for what comes next.

 

  
"How would you recognize the guy?"

 

  
"Cause he's why Chris and I came to Pawnee."

 

  
"What are you?"

 

  
"FBI."

 

  
Leslie closes her eyes and the crown of Grace's head. Her pointer finger rests there on the baby's forehead when she opens her eyes and levels her gaze at Ben.

 

  
"Is she in danger?"

 

  
"I don't know. The guy - the guy Chris and I were chasing - his name is Harvey Grist and he's ex-CIA. He and his partner dropped off the grid about a year ago, just stopped showing up for work, and then we started hearing things about arms dealers smuggling nuclear weapons into the country with the help of some former CIA agents."

 

  
"But what does this have to do with Grace?" Ben opens his mouth but closes it. Leslie holds Grace tighter, as if this man Harvey lurked in the very shadows of the trees. Everything smells like pine and she notes the juxtaposition of something sweet and something frightening and she chokes out the words, "What does this have to do with me?"

 

  
Because that is the truth - Grace was left for her. Her name was on the note. The phrase her father had passed to her mother passed to Leslie had been the only message. Leslie thinks of her father, the sweet candy salesman, and blinks. She doesn't know what the message means. Her father is gone. Her mother is gone. The message had been for Leslie. Grace was for Leslie.

 

  
"Have you ever heard of Harvey Grist?" Ben watches her and Leslie shakes her head. He pulls out his phone and shows a picture. The man is old, grizzled, with a nose that looks like it had been broken many times. She thinks vaguely that it could be Ron twenty years from now if Ron could ever be convinced to shave off his mustache. She shakes her head and Ben sighs. He scratches the back of his neck and something occurs to Leslie.

 

  
"Is that why you slept with me?" Her spine goes straight and she holds very still.

 

  
"No, god no. Leslie what we have is just me and you. It happened because I…” he runs a hand through his hair and laughs, “cause I want you and I want you to want me.”

 

  
“How am I supposed to believe you? You lied to me.”

 

  
He doesn’t refute it. He thins his lips and nods, “I know. I could tell you to believe me cause your life depends on it. Grace’s life too probably. I could tell you that the way I feel about you hurts my ability to protect both of you and if I was a better man I would stop thinking about what it feels like to hold you. I can promise you that I didn’t even think you and Grace had anything to with my case until I recognized the handwriting on your note. We had no idea if Harvey Grist would even show up in Pawnee. The town was in an email account we were tracking between him and his partner. It was a hunch.  I could tell you that my hunches are good. I could tell you I’m a great agent and not a bad guy, but you don’t have to believe any of it cause I lied to you and there is nothing I can do take that away.”

 

  
Leslie watches him during his speech. She takes it in and lets out the first question that bubbles up, "Are you even any good at math?"

 

  
His mouth quirks, "I was an accounting major for a while in undergrad. Chris is terrible at math which is why I did all the work. He's more of a people person. It let him meet lots of people quickly."

 

  
"Where is Chris now?"

 

  
"I think he went to Indianapolis in search of Grist. We know he spent sometime there back in the 70's. He figured out the connection long before I did. Which is unusual for us. But I ah,” he laughs a little, “was distracted."

 

  
She feels Ben's eyes on her as she sways, rocks Grace, but the movement is more for her own benefit. It is keeping her steady when she really wants to scream. She needed to be able to count on him. She needed to believe that maybe he had come into her life to be her constant when everyyhing else was slipping away, but that wasn't true. Like the world, he had just cracked her open.

 

  
"Leslie?"

 

  
She is walking now, looping the grove in a half-formed circle, bending at the knees and rocking. Her hair has fallen into her eyes and she doesn't bother to push it back.

 

  
"Leslie?"

 

  
"I just need a minute."

 

  
"What do you want me to do?"

 

  
This brings her to a stop and she stares at him. He hesistates and nothing about the Ben Wyatt she knows is hesistant. The thought flits into her brain that she wants him right now. The condifant Ben is kind of cocky and she likes this more vulnerable Ben. This Ben is more human to her than the guy who shot all the cans off the fence. She recalls the stories he told her when they were in the bunker, whispered into her ear late at night when he snuck into her sleeping bag. How he had played shortstop as a kid and that a girl named Cindy Eckhart had been his high school crush. There had been long explanations this fantasy series he thinks she might like - Game of Thrones - and maybe more than a couple  _numbers robot_ jokes on her part when he got a little too exact about all the radiation numbers.

 

  
 _That_ Ben had become her friend. He was the one she yearned for because when he held her in his arms he trembled. She didn't know if FBI Ben, the one who cautioned her against going into Pawnee, put a gun in her hands, and stood before her now talking about arms dealers and handwriting analysis, was that Ben the same?

 

  
“You can protect us?”

 

  
He takes a step toward her, “No one knows Grist better than I do. I’ve been hunting him for a year.”

 

  
She shivers at the word  _hunt._ She doesn’t like it. She holds Grace closer, “Stay. Stay and help me protect Grace”

 

  
Leslie turns to leave, but Ben calls out, “What about us?”

 

  
When she turns around he approaches steadily, stops a hair’s breadth away from her, and it is every ounce of control she has to keep from leaning into him. Why couldn’t he be that for her?

  
  
“I’m not arrogant enough to imagine we have a shot after I lied to you, but I need to know where we stand. So I can protect you and Grace.”

 

  
“I’m going to go back to Pawnee in a few days. To help them rebuild. And I’m taking Grace with me.”

 

  
“Leslie, that is foolish.”

 

  
“But it is the right thing to do.”

 

  
He doesn’t argue with her and Leslie wonders if he agrees. That helping other people was important too. He says, “It’s safest if Grist can’t find you. Hiding may not feel brave, but it is the smartest tactic.”

 

  
Her eyes flash, “You don’t get to call the shots. If you want to help then come with us and if not then stay here.”

 

  
His jaw sets, “I can’t keep you safe if you’re going to ignore my advice.”

 

  
They stare each other down and Leslie remembers how annoying he can be, how infuriating, but deep down she knows he is right. She may not like confidant Ben, the FBI Ben who hunts people down, but she knows he is good. She knows it because even though she doesn’t trust him with  _her_ she trusts him with Grace. He holds her stare, but never moves to touch her. The truth has wedged a distance between them.

 

  
Leslie feels the heat rise in her neck and she is glad Grace is there in her arms, a natural shield. She licks her lips and for a second considers saying  _screw it,_ but then she remembers the fury licking her ribs. She remembers what it feels like to lie on the bottom of that bathtub, to wonder where he is, and how vulnerable it feels. And she just isn’t ready to do that. There is too much at stake in this world now for her to say  _screw it_.

 

  
“I’m still going to Pawnee.”

 

  
“And I’ll go with you.”

 

  
“But?”

 

  
“But I can protect you better if people think we’re a couple. They won’t question why I’m with you.”

 

  
She laughs, “How am I not supposed to think that is an angle?”

 

  
He holds up both palms, “I’ll be a perfect gentleman in private. I promise,” he tips his eyebrows up, “Leslie, I will get you to trust me again.”

 

  
“I just want you to help me keep Grace safe.”

 

  
“And if you follow my lead I will do that. You too.”

 

  
“See I’m not a following type of girl,” she laughs, “This has got to be a partnership or no deal.”

 

  
“It doesn’t work that way. I’m letting you go to Pawnee cause if I bodily tie you to the bed Ron will put a gun to my head. But when it comes to your safety and Grace’s safety this can’t work like a committee meeting. You’ve got to let me do my job.”

 

  
Leslie scrunches up her face. He really is infuriating.  “I get one veto. One time when we’ll do it my way and not yours.”

 

  
“April’s coming with us.”

 

  
“She’s a child.”

 

  
“She’s good and she wants too.”

 

  
“Andy’ll come too. I won’t have you endangering them for me and Grace.”

 

  
“They’ll do it anyway.”

 

  
Leslie thins her lips, “But beyond Ann and Ron we don’t tell anyone else. It stops there. I’m not putting my friends at risk.”

 

  
“Even if they want too?”

 

  
“They’re my friends. Not shields.”

 

  
He steps back, crosses his arms, and nods, “Then I get a veto too. One time you’ll do what I say. No questions.”

 

  
“Fine.”

 

  
“Fine.”

 

  
And she leaves him there in the darkening woods.

 

  
**

 

  
Ben waits until Leslie is out of sight to exhale. He rubs both hands over his face and crouches. Scoops up a handful of pine needles and tosses it between his fingers.

 

  
He  _will_  get her to trust him again.

 

  
He  _will_  protect her and Grace.

 

  
He  _will_  figure out someway to extricate her from his heart and give into her completely.

 

  
And he  _will_  keep one terrible truth from her:  that he thinks Harvey Grist is Leslie’s father.

 

  
The message in that note had been personal. It could have only been from someone who knew Leslie. It was a hunch, but Ben’s hunches were golden. Data and patterns was what he was good at. When his gut told him something it always turned out to be a pattern that hadn’t risen to the surface quite yet.

 

  
And sure as Ben is, he isn’t quite ready to tell Leslie. Not until he has some sort of proof. She hadn’t recognized the man, but the photo was poor and Grist could always have had surgery. It wasn’t hard to change your appearance when you were someone like him.

 

  
She  _is_ going to trust him again. Ben vows she will because the idea that someone like Leslie Knope has given up on him is too much for him to bear. The world has broken. He isn’t ready to break with it.

 

  
**

 

  
The city of Indianapolis is ravaged. The bombs may not have hit it, but people did. They stripped it of its elegance and civilization and that was before the radiation hit. In the storm’s aftermath people fell in the streets. Without electricity there was no way to hold back the storm water and sewage that leaked out from broken pipes. Under an Indiana summer sun, the city boiled. No one buried the dead. Whoever was smart enough to bunker down for the storm, to not drink the water, realized that in order to survive they were going to have to turn savage.

 

  
Chris was lucky. He had found refuge from the radiation in a firehouse. He befriended the local unit alongside as many other citizens the firehouse could hold. It teemed with people and Chris spent the storm talking to every single one of them. Carefully he questioned them on the off chance they might have noticed the arrival of a stranger in the days before the bombs went off. But of course it was a shot in the dark. No one could remember the day before the storm. Together the makeshift community barricaded themselves from the people who begged to be let in. There wasn’t any more room, enough water, or the chance of air.

 

  
And after Chris helped bury the bodies they found huddled in the doorway to the firehouse, he set off for the one place he knew Grist had in Indianapolis. It was an old safe house from the 70’s, a decript apartment building, and one the CIA had long ago abandoned. But people like Grist thrived off routine. Chris took a chance and lucked out. There was someone living in the bowels of the apartment building. All Chris has to do was wait him out.

 

  
And that is how Chris got caught. He had positioned himself in an abandoned gas station across the street. Used a pair of binoculars he lifted from an abandoned camping store, ate jerky, and drank Gatorade. He tried not to think about what his diet was doing to his body or the radiation exposure he was risking. Instead he sat and waited for Grist to appear. And so intent was he on watching, that he didn’t hear the back door to the gas station creak or the step of rubber soles on linoleum. The only sound he heard was the click of a gun as it was placed against the back of his scull and then the voice –

 

  
“Okay, son you’re going to tell me who the hell you are and why I shouldn’t put a bullet in your head.”


	3. Chapter 3

The first time Leslie walks into her bedroom after the bombs go off she feels like a ghost.

 

  


Her sheets are wrinkled and dust litters notebooks scattered across the floor. She picks one up. It is a report on alternative funding for social programs in the Pawnee government. She wonders vaugely what would have happened if Pawnee's government really had shut down, if Ben was just a state auditor, and Grace had never appeared.

 

But then Grace had cries and knocks Leslie out of her reverie.

 

The first time she comes home Leslie swallows hard and sets to work.

 

They shift and sort her home into a house made for five people. Andy and April take the downstairs guest room and Ben, the room next to her bedroom. She used to use it as an office. As Andy and Ben haul her extra copies of the Pawnee Journal out to the garage, Leslie tells herself this is what is required. This new world is about purging and letting go.

 

She hesistates as she helps April put clean sheets on the bed. April is a beautiful young flower. Maybe Leslie shouldn't help her shack up with a guy, even if that guy is Andy. Surely, her mother would care? But Leslie keeps this thought to herself because April doesn't think of herself as the precious flower Leslie wishes she could remain. In a world like this, that is what matters - how you see yourself - and not what other people think.

 

Ben sends April and Andy to  _Bed, Bath, and Beyond_  with a list. He gives April the keys to the truck and asks her if she has her gun. She pats her t-shirt and Ben claps her on the back. Andy demonstrates some of his kung-fu moves and Ben nods his approval. It is only after they leave that Leslie realizes what they are going to do.

 

"They can't just steal things. You're turning them into criminals," she follows Ben into his makeshift bedroom.

 

"And?"

 

"It's wrong." She stands at the foot of the daybed that she kept in there for lazy Sunday afternoons spent reading reports. Her mother stayed there once when her pipes froze. Otherwise the office is dusty with file cabinents and Leslie's entire collection of political biographies carefully organized over four bookshelves. It is a narrow room and Ben didn’t insist she move anything out. He lets this room remain almost the same. The only difference is him and a few things he’s shoved under the bed. He kneels next to the bed now and pulls out a locked metal trunk.

 

"What's that?" Leslie stammers.

 

Ben pulls a key from a chain around his neck and unlocks the trunk. It is filled with guns. Guns and knives. Binoculars and a wicked looking ax.

 

"You can't bring that into my house," she touches her throat.

 

"You own guns."

 

"I own a gun. A hunting rifle given to me by my father. You have enough to arm a militia."

 

"Your father gave you a gun?"

 

She narrowed her eyes, "I don't want this in my house."  
  
She kicks the trunk with the toe of her boot. She thinks of Grace, who sleeps in the middle of her bed, surrounded by pillows. A baby should not be in a house with that many weapons, locked up or not.

 

Ben stands and exhales, "Are you using your veto?"

 

"No, I'm using common sense."

 

"They're Ron's guns."

 

"And I'd say the same thing to Ron."

 

"Are you sure? Are you sure this isn't because you don't trust me?" 

 

" No, it is because when you have that many guns you invite violence."

 

"Leslie, we live in a violent world. Someone set nuclear bombs off in at least U.S. cities, likely more. People rioted. They tore through your parks and your grocery stores. They tried to steal the generators from St. Joseph's. Generators that were keeping babies alive in the neonatal unit. They tried to steal them because they are scared. I didn't send April and Andy to Bed, Bath, & Beyond for throw pillows. They're getting things we’re going to need - canning supplies and every candle they can find. And next to the Bed, Bath, & Beyond there is a Baby r'Us. They’re going to steal from there too. Steal a crib and diapers, formula and clothes. She's going to need clothes and things. We’re going to need things. Things like guns." His runs a hand through his hair, sets it standing on end.

 

Leslie hugs her arms around herself, "You don't have to yell at me," she whispers, "you could just try explaining things to me."

 

Frustrated, Ben stuffs his hands in his pockets and looks at his feet, "I'm not used to explaining myself. People usually just follow my orders."

 

She tries to smile, "I'm not most people."

 

He laughs, "I know."

 

Leslie tries again, "So what else was on your list?"

 

"There is an REI. I'm hoping it hasn't been too picked over. I told them to get lanterns. Water purification tablets. Energy bars. Hiking boots. Everything."

 

"I'm a size 7."

 

"I know. I checked the shoes in your cloest."

 

"You should have asked. I have lots of that stuff already. I'm great at camping."

 

"I hate camping," Ben smiles.

 

"But you seem like such..." she trails, "a survivalist."

 

"That's because I had to learn to be. Part of being a field agent. I almost died during bootcamp. Forgot to pack a tent. Chris saved my ass from freezing in the Appalachian mountains cause he packed an extra. Always be prepared was his motto."

 

"I bet he would have made a great Boy Scout."

 

"Oh, he was. Made Eagle Scout. Loved this survivalist shit. Used to talk my ear off. I learned everything I know from him and the FBI. He was better at this. At the people thing. He should be doing this not me."

 

“Hey,” she says, “you’re doing great.” She wants to hug him, but something keeps her rooted in her spot.

 

“Chris would be better at keeping you and Grace alive. Safe.”

 

“We’re pretty alive so far,” she tries to keep her tone bright and Ben tips up his eyebrows and Leslie tries to make a joke, “I don’t know if we’re safe with all those guns in the house.”

 

“Those guns will save your life.” He smiles when he says it and she feel triumphant.

 

“Let’s agree to disagree,” she swings her arms and decides to say it because it is true, “I’d choose you. If I had a choice about who is going to help me keep Grace safe. I’d choose you every time.”

 

Leslie levels her gaze so their eyes meet and a heat rises in her throat. She knows that look. It is the same one they shared right before they kissed the first time and it is the same way he looked at her before she let him into her house the next night, when he showed up on her porch with food and beer. It is a long dawning as if something is rising up in each of them. It is something between them. That thing that tells her they could be so good together.

 

If only she could trust that feeling, that look.

 

She wonders if the Ben infront of her is the whole Ben. His confession betrays the fact that this isn't his natural mode. He isn't a fighter. She remembers he told her in the bunker, that he likes puzzles, solving things, and making them right. She could see how that fit with justice. And it occurs to her that something sent him down this path. Something happened in his past that made him become a FBI agent. Made him become a man who lied and kept weapons nearby.

 

"So why do you do it? This FBI stuff?"

 

"That's a story for a night when you get me really drunk," he laughs. She relaxes under his gaze. It makes her shift. He knew she was changing the subject, breaking the tension between them with that question about the FBI. And he keeps his eyes direct and steady.

 

"I still don't like that they're stealing."

 

Ben's jaw shifts and he lifts an eyebrow, "Well, keep a tab and someday you can pay the big bad corporations back. In the mean time, how do you feel about learning to fight with a knife?"

 

The first time Leslie walks into her bedroom after the bombs go off she feels like a ghost because she is no longer herself.

 

She makes peanut butter and banana sandwiches and waits anxiously for Andy and April to come home. And she helps them unload in the darkening night, quickly, while Ben rocks Grace in his arms. He doesn't want neighbors to see their stockpile. She unloads and doesn't think twice about the morality of it until she is alone in her bathroom hours later.

 

Instead, she drags a tumbling mat out of her hall closet, pushes back the coffee table, and lights Yankee candles around the room until everything smells like a meadow and the ocean and sugar cookies. And then she turns to face Ben and begins to learn how to defend herself. She concentrates on how to block an attack and wound someone stronger than herself. She listens and processes and when she finally takes down Andy she feels herself changing.

 

She is becoming someone else.

 

But that doesn't stop her from taking the sugar cookie candle into her bathroom after everyone else has fallen asleep. She curls up against the shower door and does what Ben suggested. She begins a tally. In a blank notebook she begins a log of everything questionable she has done in the name of survival. In the name of protecting Grace. She starts with the stolen goods and after chewing on her pen for a good ten minutes writes down the fact that she let someone else to bury her mother. The fact she left Ann back at Ron's instead of staying like her best friend had begged. She almost writes down Ben, but she's not sure if he is objectable. She’s still waiting to see.

 

She writes it all down because Leslie recognizes the cost of living in a world like this:  it mattering only how you saw yourself. When everyone else stopped caring and you became your only judge it was too easily to let things like conviction and morality slip. It was too easy to become a ghost of yourself.

 

**

 

**Six Months Later**

 

Ben cups a hand over his eyes like a visor and scans the market set out in front of Pioneer Hall.

 

The sun shines weakly in the cold November air. He shifts his shoulders and tugs the collar of his coat higher on his neck. Despite the chill in the air there is still a strong crowd out today. People mill from tent to tent with baskets filled with goods they’ve bought:  golden loafs of bread, cuts of meat, and the last of the fall vegetables. Someone pushes a bicycle and Deputy Carl patrols the crowd, his voice carrying over the din as he tries to tell someone about Avatar. Ben smiles. In the past months he’s heard a lot about Avatar, more than even him, a fanboy at heart, cared to hear. Someone plays a guitar and it drowns out Carl as he makes his way to the far end of the market.

 

The weekly market in front of Pioneer Hall just sort of happened. Just like the fact that Ben became in charge of security for Pawnee just sorta happened. How Andy and Carl were his deputies. How Leslie had been elected mayor.

 

No, that didn’t just happen. It was inevitable. When she showed up at Pioneer Hall with plans scribbled on napkins and a level head, Councilman Howser practically fell at her feet with gratitude. He had been holding Pawnee together, but he had no idea how to take the next step, how to move forward.

 

The first thing Leslie did was call a rally. It nearly caused Ben to turn grey - her up on the front steps of Pioneer Hall with hundreds of people, angry and confused, asking what she was going to do about it.

 

But Leslie talked through a scratchy portable microphone about how they were better off together than apart. She told them it was foolish to give up on one another. They were neighbors. Friends. This was  _their_ town and only they could destroy it.

 

And a week later through an ad hoc election done on scrapes of paper, counted by Ethel Beavers, they elected Leslie mayor. Councilman Howser and Joan Callamenzo were elected to sit with Leslie on a three person city council that oversaw the daily chore of running Pawnee.

 

The first few months had been rough. At first Joan went against everything Leslie tried to do. She just didn’t like Leslie and no matter how sane the idea, Joan was against it. Joan needed to be sweet talked, flattered, and that was something neither Ben nor Leslie could manage. So they gritted their teeth and bore her best they could.

 

Then there were the the Newports. The Newports had abandoned Pawnee only to return months later demanding payment for the things that had been stripped from their mansion and factory. The first thing they wanted were the generators Leslie had appropriated for St. Joseph. Ben almost bodily put Leslie and Grace over his shoulder and carried them back to Ron’s over that one. Leslie returned the generators and struck a deal with Ken Hoate to donate theirs to the hospital. In exchange, the Wamapoke regained much of the land the original Pawnee settlers claimed from the tribe all those years ago.

 

“What is it going to take to get you to buy some of my vegetables, Ben Wyatt!” Tanya calls from her tent.

 

Ben runs a hand over his beard and smiles, “You know how much Leslie hates vegetables.”

 

She rolls her eyes, “But  _you_  love them.”

 

“I don’t have anything to trade,” he holds up empty hands.

 

“I’m going to get it out of you someday, Ben,” Tanya points at him, but there is a glimmer in her eye. She likes him, which drives Leslie crazy, “where you got those butternut squash from. That dish you brought to the Thanksgiving feast last week in Ramsett Park was spectacular, but I didn’t sell you the squash and I’m the only person in all of Pawnee that sells butternut squash.”

 

Ben gives her a coy smile. He’s not going to tell her that they came from the garden at Ron’s. To Pawnee Ron, Ann, Donna, Tom, and Jerry died in the wave of people who fled Pawnee. Their names were listed in the official book of the dead the town compiled in City Hall. It was safest that way.

 

But Ben and Ron meet up once every three weeks half way, in a secluded creek bed, to exchange supplies and information. Ron brings fresh meat and produce from the garden. Ben fills the varied requests of their friends:  erotica novels for Donna, various cashmere throws from Tom’s apartment, paint supplies for Jerry, and trinkets for Ann. Ron complains that she’s filling the cabin with  _woman_ stuff:  pictures for the walls, a crocheted afghan that used to live on her couch, and baking dishes. Ron never asks for anything except updates on Leslie and April and Grace. He brushes it off, but Ben knows he is uncomfortable being this far from things.

 

“You can always come down. Live in Pawnee instead of up there.”

 

But Ron always shook his head, “Someone needs to keep a safe house for you guys. Plus, some of us aren’t ready to come back. We like only having to rely on ourselves and our friends.”

 

Ben knows Ron isn’t talking about himself. He is talking about Ann.

 

It is something he and Leslie have talked in circles. Ann was strong, but she was also skittish. When they set for Pawnee all those months ago she begged Leslie to stay. She used Grace against Leslie. Told her it was foolish to go down there when someone as dangerous as Harvey Grist is surely going to come back to collect this precious baby girl. She even tried to guilt trip Ben and accused him of letting Leslie steamroll him.

 

“If you care about her as much as you say you do then you won’t let her do this,” her eyes had flashed at him. But it didn’t work because Ben knew it wasn’t a matter of telling Leslie no. She didn’t know what the word meant. And it turned out that Ann was just as stubborn as Leslie. The two hadn’t talked. That was why Ron asked about Leslie and Grace. It wasn’t just for him. Ann wanted to know too. She was too proud to say it. Too angry at him and Leslie. Ben was all right with Ann’s anger. She thought he had real pull with Leslie because they appeared to be in love.

 

But they weren’t actually together. Not like that.

 

They’d told no one the agreement they’d reached in the woods. He and Leslie were the last line of protection for Grace. They had to give the appearance of an impenetrable wall. Even Andy and April, though they knew a lot, still thought Ben only slept on the day bed in Leslie’s office as a matter of appearances. He and Leslie said he didn’t sleep in there because Grace did. The excuse was so weak that April and Andy assumed it couldn’t actually true. Surely he snuck into her bed or her into his at night.

 

But in the six months since the bombs went off Ben hadn’t slept with Leslie.

 

But he had touched her. A thousand times. A brush of the wrist when they handed Grace off to one another. A quick goodbye kiss to keep up appearances in public. A arm stretched over the back of the couch when they relaxed with Andy and April after dinner. His hand around her waist when they were at the Thanksgiving Feast in Ramsett Park last week.

 

That one had been Leslie’s idea - the picnic - not the hand at the waist. She’d organized the community picnic because people needed hope. Winter was coming. And there was no energy to heat homes. Few people had gas left to run their cars. Ben had seen a horse pulling a cart down Main Street last week. Right now Leslie was leading a team into the woods to begin logging cords of wood to sell. They couldn’t keep people from stealing onto community property to strip it for wood, but they could try to offer a solution. Cut, ready to go wood, cheaply traded in the weekly market might entice people to do it responsibly. To not destroy the land around them and still keep people warm.

 

Ben smiles as he thinks about Leslie this morning. He’d knocked on her bedroom door with Grace in his arms. The little girl latched one hand around his neck and sucked on her thumb with the other. She was still in her pajamas. When it was his morning to take care of her Ben liked to linger.

 

“Someone wants to say bye,” he called out.

 

“One sec,” she said but it was too late. Ben had walked in and Leslie stood there with her flannel shirt unbuttoned. The swell of her breast peaked out along with a black lace bra, “I said one sec,” she huffed. Her fingers made neat work of buttoning up the shirt. Ben swallowed and Grace giggled. He was glad one of them thought it was funny.

 

Leslie did not. She took Grace and turned her back on him. The message was clear:  go away.

 

He had touched Leslie a thousand times, but he hadn’t been with her since the bombs went off. He had hugged her goodbye each morning in order to put on a show for April and Andy, but he hadn’t held her. The difference meant everything. They were willing partners and sometimes even friends, but Leslie would not let him any closer. And Ben still hadn’t told her the awful truth:  Harvey Grist and her father were one in the same.

 

The photographs were thirty years old. Leslie’s father abandoned her and Marlene when she was six. And Ben only had Grist’s most recent CIA portrait. Without the help of aging software, Ben couldn’t make a exact I.D. but the general characteristics were the same:  the blue eyes and skin color.

 

But it had been six months and Grist hadn’t shown up. Every moment of every day Ben knew exactly where Leslie and Grace were. They agreed neither could fall into any pattern. Leslie changed locations of meetings regularly and rarely promised to be somewhere. It made governing more difficult, but when Ben had insisted she hadn’t used her veto. She knew it was smart.

 

Grace was always with Leslie, Ben, April, or Andy. She was getting too big for the carrier that Ben liked to strap to his chest and carry her in. She was walking. Her blond wisps had turned into curls. She called Leslie  _Mom_ and Ben  _Dad._ He didn’t think about it too often – what she meant to him now. What it would cost his heart to let her go. She was embedded as deep as Leslie.

 

Ben takes a deep breath and lets the cold air cut his lungs. He told himself the same thing he’d told himself for the past six months.  _He’ll come_. And they’d be ready. Andy, April, and Leslie knew how to fight now. All four of them knew the escape routes to Ron’s cabin. They knew how to protect Grace and Ben knew how to protect Leslie.

 

What he didn’t expect, though, was that Grist knew all of that. That Grist had Ben’s play book.

 

See when he lets the breath out it shudders because through the crowd, on the other side of the market, Ben sees Grist. The man wears an oversized hunting jacket and stares hard at Ben. He makes a subtle movement and Ben sees the next thing:  Chris, his hair shaggy and unkept, standing next to Grist, side by side, holding a gun to the back of Jean-Ralphio. Grist beckons with a single finger and Ben cuts through the crowd toward him.

***

Ben cuts through the crowd toward Harvey Grist. Chris won’t look at him. Ben keeps his jaw steady and tries to catch Jean-Ralphio’s eye.

  


He wants to tell the young man it will be okay. He will come out of this alive. Sweat beads up on the kid’s forehead.

As Ben gets closer, Grist takes a step back and Ben recognizes the limp in his left leg. He took a bullet to the calf while on a covert CIA operation overseas in the early 90’s. Ben swallows because it sinks in that this isn’t just Harvey Grist anymore. This is Leslie Knope’s father.

 

But right now he has to get Grist away from Pioneer Hall.

 

Grist puts a finger to his lips and jerks his head. He takes the lead and Chris keeps a tight hold on Jean-Ralphio. The barrel of the gun remains pressed into the young man’s back. Ben glances back to see April standing there on the steps of Pioneer Hall where he had been just minutes before. Her gaze zeroes in on him. She takes one, two steps in his direction, but Ben jerks his head an imperceptible amount. She stops and Ben hopes she can read it in his eyes.

 

_Get Grace. Get Leslie. And get the hell out of here._

 

There is the moment where April is deciding and Ben doesn’t breathe. Her face is frozen and his mind is screaming for her to listen to him. To follow the plan.

 

And then she does. She backs up and disappears into Pioneer Hall. Grace is in there. Ben exhales and turns toward Grist. The man is watching him and for a second Ben is filled with blind terror that he saw the exchange, but if he did Grist does nothing about it. He raises an eyebrow and moves on.

They end up in JJ’s Diner. Since the bombs it had been abandoned and now shards of glass crunch under the men’s feet. Chris shoves Jean-Ralphio into a booth.

 

“Watch the coat, boss.” Jean-Ralphio brushes his shoulders, “This is from Brooks Brothers.”

 

Chris straightens his arm and holds the gun in the younger man’s face, “I will shoot you. Don’t forget that.”

 

“Let him go,” Ben leans against a table and crosses his arms. His body is tight even if his expression gives the impression of boredom, “It’s me you want. Not him.”

 

“I don’t want either of you,” Grist says, “I want to see the baby.”

 

Ben exhales, “That’s not going to happen.”

 

Grist holds up both hands and makes a ‘ta-da’ motion, “And the walls come falling down,” he advances toward Ben, “Does it make you feel like a big man to stand up to me? Why do you think you have a chance in hell? I’ve got your partner on my side. I know about your little posse. Andy the deputy and April Croft Tomb Raider. I know your playbook Ben Wyatt and you don’t scare me. If I want to see that little girl I’m goddamn going to see her.”

 

Ben doesn’t move a muscle. Grist’s hair falls across his forehead and Ben tries to imagine how those angry blue eyes could be related in any way to Leslie. But he can’t.

 

“You forgot about Leslie,” he says it quietly.

 

Grist straightens, “What?”

“You forgot about Leslie. You’re going to need to get through her before you get anywhere near that little girl. What are you going to do? Shoot your own daughter?”

 

Something clicks in Grist’s eyes and he steps back. He looks at Chris whose face is passive. Grist looks back at Ben. And then he laughs. He throws back his head and lets out a maniacal laugh that fills the corners of the room. He clutches his stomach and doubles over. He laughs and laughs until he cannot catch his breath.

 

Ben sees the disbelief and confusion on Chris’ face and he takes the chance because it might be the only one he gets. In the split second it takes to pull his gun and point it at Grist’s head Grist stops laughing. He stares past the gun at Ben.

 

“I don’t think you’re going to shoot me son.”

 

“I will.”

 

“Then Chris here will shoot this kid here.”

 

Ben’s eyes stray to Chris. He wants to plead with his partner. After all these months what happened? Where was the man Ben knew? But he gets nothing from Chris. His face remains stoic.

 

Grist holds his hands up, “I just want to see the girl. I’m supposed to set eyes on her. Make sure she is safe.”

 

“Who is she? Why did you bring her to Pawnee?” Ben steadies the gun. He will not think about the fact that this man is Leslie’s father. He won’t think about her face if he has to tell her that he was the man who shot her father. That Ben kept this secret from her all these months. He can’t and won’t think about the fact that it will cost him Leslie and likely Grace to kill Grist.

 

“I brought her here to hide her. The people who destroyed this country want that little girl and it was decided that Pawnee, that Leslie Knope, was her best chance of survival.”

 

“ _You_  were responsible for those bombs. You and your partner.”

 

“That’s not true. This is much bigger than two rogue CIA officers.”

 

“We were… I was tracking you. We had evidence of rogue CIA officers making deals with international arms dealers.”

 

“You had rumors. And think about it Ben,” Grist steps toward Ben and Ben retreats until he runs into a table. Grist’s voice lowers like he wants Ben to really listen, “We’re talking about portable nuclear bombs. Thirteen of them. How would two intelligence guys get the funds to pay for weapons like that? How did we get them into the country? Those things had short range triggers. You had to be within the blast zone. So somehow my partner and I got thirteen other guys to blow themselves and millions of people up. Think about it, Ben. I’m just a guy from Minnesota. Just like you. I’m not a terrorist.”

 

Ben tries to keep his mind on the single fact that he knows Harvey Grist is a threat. Harvey Grist is the threat. He can’t be swayed with details. Even if Grist is pointing out real holes in Ben’s story that doesn’t change the fact. Harvey Grist is a threat.

 

“I just need to see the little girl. Then Chris and I’ll be on our way. We don’t want to take her away from you and we don’t want to hurt anybody.”

 

“Who is she?”

 

“I’m not going to tell you that,” Grist is still holding up his hands. He isn’t laughing anymore, “I like you Ben. Chris has told me a lot about you. I’ve watched you and Leslie. I know you’re in love with her, which is why I think you haven’t shot my head off yet. You couldn’t live with yourself if you killed Leslie Knope’s father.”

 

Something flickers on Chris’ face – confusion – and it distracts Ben. It distracts him and Grist seizes the opportunity. He grabs Ben’s wrists and the two men wrestle over the gun. Grist is bigger, but Ben has a better grip. They struggle and somewhere around them a table knocks over. Jean-Ralphio screeches and Ben’s vision is blurred. Grist twists his arm back and with his other hand gouges a thumb into Ben’s eye.

 

And then Ben remembers the limp. It will knock both of them off balance, but it is a calculated risk. He plants a solid kick to Grist’s left calf. The elder man screams and both of them fall. There is a shot and Ben feels the gun sail out of his hands and skitter across the broken glass.

 

Grist yells something and there is another bang. Smoke fills the room. Ben feels something pierce his side and then the world goes black.

 

**

 

Leslie Knope sits very still against the moonlight streaming into her room. Asleep, Grace is a dead weight in her arms. She rocks and thinks back to the day almost six months ago Ben brought the rocking chair home. He found it in an abandoned church nursery. It is wood and wicker. Leslie is sure her mother had something like it. And Leslie loves it.

 

Since then she has spent hours rocking Grace asleep in that chair. She told her stories and sang her songs. On nights when Leslie can’t sleep she’ll scoop the little girl up, tuck her into her arms, and retreat to the rocker where they both find sleep in the swaying embrace. And more than once Leslie woke up to find them both covered in one of her quilts. A silent testimony that Ben had checked in on them sometime around dawn.

 

Now Ben’s shallow breathing drags Leslie back to this moment. This now. He lies on her bed and it is everything Leslie has in her not to curl up along side him. His hair is clumped from sweat and she watches his chest rise and fall. If he is breathing then he is still alive.

 

Andy found her in the woods. He didn’t make a scene. He told her there was a leak in the northwest dam. That was their code for Grist. When they were alone he told her April had Grace and they were waiting for her in the stream bed. From there they were to take the truck to Ron’s cabin. Andy was going back for Ben.

 

But Leslie couldn’t do it. She couldn’t leave him. He was going to be furious with her when he found out, but that was too bad. She knew April would take Grace to Ron’s if Leslie didn’t show up in an hour. Grace would be safe no matter what. Ben was the one who needed her so she ignored Andy and drove like a bat out of hell back into Pawnee. It only took a few questions of vendors at the market to find out Ben was last seen heading down Main with Jean-Ralphio and two other men. Leslie had forced herself to remain calm when Tanya tried to lecture her about vegetables. She’d cut the woman off and headed with Andy in the direction of Grist.

 

“Leslie?” Ben croaks. Leslie sits forward. Grace’s hand dangles near Ben and his fingers find it. When his pointer finger pushes the sleeve of her pajamas up and rubs the soft inside of her wrist, Leslie loses it. The tears fall hard and fast. Ben tries to sit up, but the wound in his side makes him give up.

 

“Leslie, it’s alright,” he soothes, “Grace is safe. It’s alright.”

 

Leslie abandons the chair and climbs into the bed next to Ben. It is awkward with the sleeping Grace in her arms. She climbs from the foot of the bed and settles in the middle. Grace is cocooned between them. Ben’s arm stretches above her head and kind of curls around both of them. She can feel his fingers on the slope of her shoulder.

 

She hiccups and pulls the blanket around all of them. When she is done she looks up at Ben. The bedroom is all shadow. There are no streetlights to give light. She can’t see his eyes, but she knows he is looking at her.

 

“What happened?” His hand curls up and touches her hair. His fingers stroke her temple and it is a moment more intimate than any they’ve shared since those nights in the bunker.

 

“Jean-Ralphio is dead.”

 

Ben exhales a defeated sigh and Leslie arches up. She finds his face in the dark and touches his cheek briefly before curling her fingers into a fist and dropping it to his chest.

 

“It’s not your fault.”

 

“It was my gun.”

 

“I know,” she says, “Was there a struggle?”

 

“Yeah. Grist and I were fighting over the gun when it went off.”

 

“Grist stabbed you with a pocket knife. It gouged your side. Didn’t do any real damage though Dr. Harris said it’s going to hurt like a bitch when the painkillers wear off in the morning. Says you have to stay off your feet for the next few weeks.”

 

And then something dawns on Ben and his body stiffens.

 

“Why aren’t you and Grace at the cabin? Why are you still in Pawnee?”

 

“And leave you?”

 

“Leslie,” Ben’s voice hitches, “there was a plan.”

 

“And April was on her way to Ron’s with Grace. She was never in any danger. I turned back with Andy because I wasn’t going to leave you.”

 

“Leslie, you can’t do things like that. I’m expendable. You’re not.”

 

It is a good thing Grace is between them because Leslie is tempted to punch him.

 

“You and me. That has always been the deal. You and me protect Grace. I can’t do this by myself.”

 

Ben doesn’t say anything for a long time and Leslie wishes she knew what he was thinking. For months it’s been a back and forth between them. A strange dance of intimacy. She can recall the way his grin when Grace smiled tugged on her heart every time. The way his arms fit around her when he showed her how to unarm an attacker crept up on her sometimes. She was an expert at the echo of his footsteps falling through the house.

 

Over all these months Leslie had been paying attention to Ben’s movements. She knew he took the steps two at a time when Grace woke up from her nap. In bed at night she listened to the gentle padding of bare feet when he was going to bed. And then there was his hesitation outside her door when she cried.  It caught up with her sometimes – that fury and grief that burned in her chest after her mother had died. Those feelings bubbled to the surface like lava and at night Leslie let them have their range. She hid in her bathroom and shut the door, but somehow Ben always knew. He never knocked. Never interrupted. But she heard him  – the uncertain footfalls of a friend – and that itself meant the world to her.

 

“Leslie, I have to tell you something,” he finally says.

 

“It can wait.”

 

“He came for Grace. He said he wanted to see her, but -,”

 

“Ben,” she stops him, “it can wait till tomorrow. We’ll go over everything. But for now you need to rest.”

 

“Do you know he’s gone?”

 

“We don’t know anything, but I think he is. The restaurant was booby-trapped. He set off fireworks to confuse you. It let him and Chris escape. I think he’s gone.”

 

“Still we should set guards.”

 

“I’ve got Andy and April right now. Carl is out there and the rest of the park rangers.”

 

“That’s just more bodies between him and Grace. That won’t stop him.”

 

“And neither will you if you don’t rest.” She lays her palm flat on his chest, “Grace is safe. I’m safe. You’re safe. We’re going to sleep and in the morning we’ll figure it out. Together.”

 

Ben nods and Leslie starts to sit up. He catches her elbow, “Leslie?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Can, can you stay? Just for tonight. I know I don’t have the right to ask and I’m not trying to be untoward, but can you and Grace stay? I’ll sleep better knowing you’re both within arms length.”

 

Even though he can’t see it, Leslie smiles and hopes he can hear it in her voice, “I wasn’t going anywhere. I just wanted to get another blanket. It’s going to be cold tonight.”

 

He sighs and Leslie can tell he is finally letting the pain medication have its way, “Thank you.”

 

And when his breathing falls into rhythm with Grace’s, Leslie tucks herself back into the wide embrace of Ben’s arm. His fingers fall over her shoulder and though it is a light touch, it is a touch and before she falls asleep, Leslie reaches up and presses a kiss to his cheek.

 

**

 

Ben wakes up feeling like he had been dropped off the side of a cliff. His whole torso throbs and his head is pounding. But then there is a single hand tugging on his beard.

 

“Da…Da, Da, Da!”

 

Even with his eyes still closed, Ben smiles. When he opens them Grace sits next to his head diligently investigating Ben’s face. She fists a hand of his hair and pulls.

 

“Hey there bean,” he winces and pries her fingers away. Ignoring the pain, Ben lifts Grace onto his chest. She giggles and flops onto her stomach, “Uff,” he groans. Ben lets her go back to examining his face and he lies there relishing the feel of her in his arms. He finds the soft inside of her wrist and swipes his thumb across it.

 

Everything about Grace is soft. She is wisps of blond hair, an easy smile, and boundless energy. She took to anyone and laughed easily. But Ben loved the details the most. The things he and Leslie saw because she was their charge. He loved that she refused to crawl. She rolled where she wanted to be. Ben joked she was like a steamroller. He loved that she looked for him when he came home. She’d let out a screech and then a chorus of his name,  _Da, Da, Da, Da_ , because she wanted him to know she was there. It was the details like that that Ben could not imagine missing. He wanted to be there for all of them.

 

“Are you helping Daddy wake up?” Leslie’s voice shook Ben out of his thoughts. She leaned in the doorway with a smile for Grace. She was already dressed in her usual uniform: jeans, flannel shirt with a thermal undershirt, and thick socks. Except this morning she wasn’t wearing the hiking boots Ben had gotten used to seeing her in. He tried to remember what her feet looked like in those black heels she always wore around City Hall back before the bombs but he can’t remember anymore.

 

“Ma!” Grace twists on Ben’s chest and he can’t help but grimace.

 

Leslie comes all the way into the room and picks her up, “Andy has breakfast for you. Breakfast.”

 

Ben tries to follow, but when he starts to sit up pain lances his side and he groans. Leslie touches his shoulder, “I’ll be back. Just lie still.”

 

Because he is starting to feel woozy, Ben nods. He collapses back onto the bed and waves to Grace as Leslie takes her away.

 

Slowly, it comes back to him what happened yesterday. He touches his side where Grist had gouged a knife into him, but all he feels is the padding of bandages wrapped all the way around his abdomen.

 

Jean-Ralphio was dead. Ben hadn’t known the kid well, but he had been an excellent sourceman. If Ben and Leslie needed something, Jean-Ralphio would find it. No questions asked. And he would rap for Grace sometimes.

 

He wonders what they did with the body. The ground was nearly frozen. It wouldn’t be easy to add him to the growing graveyard on the south side of town. Whatever happened to Jean-Ralphio, Ben knows Leslie took care of it. She had made sure he wasn’t forgotten. That he was treated with respect. In the next few days she would organize a funeral. And she would write to Tom. Ben was sure of it. It was what Leslie Knope did.

 

And in the meantime, Ben had to tell her the truth. He had to tell her that Grist was her father. He couldn’t keep that from her any longer. Not with him this close. Ben’s first job was to keep her and Grace safe. Feelings be damned.

 

“Penny for your thoughts,” Leslie is back with two mugs of coffee. Ben sits up slowly this time and he almost does it by himself. Leslie sets down the coffee and is there with pillows to prop him half up.

 

“I need to tell you something,” Ben is breathing heavy and he doesn’t want to think about how long it is going to take him to recover from this, “Something about Grist.”

 

“Okay,” Leslie hands him his mug. She sits on the mattress. Their hips brush. Ben notices she chooses the spot closest to him and not the rocking chair butted up against the bed, “Go ahead.”

 

Ben meets her gaze, “Harvey Grist is your father.”

 

Leslie blinks and then laughs. It is a short laugh and she finishes it with a gulp of coffee. She touches Ben’s forehead, “You maybe more out of it than I thought. No fever.”

 

“Leslie, I’m serious.”

 

“And I’m serious Ben. Grist isn’t my father. My father is dead. Died when I was a teenager.”

 

“Did you ever see a body?”

 

Her forehead wrinkles, “He was cremated. We went to Florida where he was from and spread his ashes at sea.”

 

“Leslie, I’m telling you Grist is your father.”

 

She sits taller and Ben exhales in relief. Let her get defensive. It means she was beginning to believe him, “Why would you even think that-,”

 

“The note. The phrase  _Go big or go home_. Your mom said it was something your father used to say to her.”

 

“ _Go big or go home_  isn’t code Ben. It’s just a thing we used to say in my family.”

 

“Exactly, your family Leslie. Besides the photos…”

 

“What photos?”

 

“I went to your mother’s house a few months ago and found photos of your father from when you were a kid. The eyes. The build. They match Leslie.”

 

Leslie goes very still, “You went to my mother’s house? When were you going to tell me?”

 

Ben looks into the dark pool of his coffee. He can feel any bond they’ve made over the past few months breaking, “I wanted to be sure. And yesterday when I mentioned you he went crazy. Laughed like a maniac.”

 

But Leslie is shaking her head, “It’s not my father. Even if he were alive he can’t be Harvey Grist.”

 

Ben reaches for her, but she skirts her hand away, “I know it is hard to hear.”

 

“No, it is impossible because it isn’t true. I’ve seen Grist’s photo and I’m telling you it isn’t him. My father would not blow up the world. He wouldn’t abandon a baby girl. He wouldn’t stab you.”

 

“Your father doesn’t know me.”

 

“And you don’t know my dad!” She shouts it, finally. Her coffee spills as she jerks back and Ben takes the cup from her. She lets go of it without thought. He sets it next to his on the nightstand. Leslie holds her fingers to her mouth. The tears threaten to overspill and she is holding them in. It causes her shoulders to shake, “You don’t know my dad, Ben,” She looks at him and his heart catches in his throat. He would do anything to take this away from her, “He used to send me postcards and bring me candy. Every Saturday he would take me to the park and push me on the swings. He isn’t Harvey Grist.”

 

The way she says it tells Ben she isn’t going to believe him. No matter what and for the first time Ben begins to not believe himself. Grist had been right. There were holes in his story. Leaps of imagination that even Ben couldn’t make. It didn’t make sense that two rogue CIA agents could orchestrate such an elaborate plan. He tried to ignore Grist’s seeds of doubt, but with Leslie about to break before him they creep in. He has to admit he doesn’t really know much.

 

“Leslie,” he starts and she shakes her head. She exhales long and he can tell she has conquered the emotions. He knows they will surface eventually, but not now.

 

“What else?”

 

“What?”

 

“This is your last chance, Ben. No more lies and secrets between us. We’re partners. I need to know what else.”

 

So Ben tells her everything that happened. He tells her about the doubts he has and the confusion over Chris’ betrayal. He empties everything out because he knows he has to trust someone. All these months carrying truths alone has gotten him no where. Before he had Chris and the agency. But now, now, he has Leslie. There is no one he trusts more than Leslie.

 

“That’s it?” She says when he is done.

 

“That’s it.”

 

She stands, “I’m going to get your breakfast.”

 

“Don’t you have to get to City Hall?”

 

She shakes her head, “I already had Joan and Howser over this morning. They’re going to run things for a few weeks. I’m going to stay here.”

 

“Leslie, you don’t have to do that.”

 

She pauses in the doorway, “Yeah, I do. Cause you’re the man I’m raising Grace with. You’re who I’ve chosen. I meant it when I said it was you and me.”

 

And the pain that comes with those words is worse than anything he woke up with. The painful truth that she has trusted him this entire time.

 

**

 

Ron has to say something. His cabin – his place of solitude – has been entirely run over. It started with a few pictures Ann had Ben gather from her home and then that damn afghan. Then today she and Donna did his laundry. He’d come home from hunting to find his tighty whities flapping in the sun.

 

“I am a grown man,” he follows after Ann that night into the kitchen. Jerry, Tom, and Donna are outside by the fire pit where the meat was roasting. They sensed the impending fight and skirted the cabin. Ann pulls the bread she is baking from the oven. They don’t use the energy collected from the solar panels when they can help it, but Ron’s favorite excuse was when Ann baked. She did it in sprees and it made the whole cabin smell like yeast and cinnamon, “I don’t need some woman to wash my underthings.”

 

Ann simply moves around him to set the bread onto the trivets she’d set out. She slid three round cake pans in next and Ron can’t help it. His mouth waters. She is making carrot cake. It was an indulgence, but she wanted to celebrate the fact that she had learned how to make cream cheese. It had taken months of experimenting, but she finally mastered it with the happy contribution of Wilma, their cow.

 

“Are you listening to me?”

 

“I don’t know why you are yelling at me. Donna helped,” Ann tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

 

“Cause it was your idea.”

 

“You don’t know that.”

 

“I do. Everyone does. Everything we do around here comes from you,” Ann stares and Ron realizes the depth of what he just said. He blusters, “It’s true. We wouldn’t do anything around here if it weren’t for you and your womanly, um, touch. Which makes you responsible for the choice to invade the last bit of my privacy and -,”

 

But then Ann touches him. It is her palm on his chest and her small smile, “Ron you can just say thank you.”

 

And that is the end of it. That is the only conversation they have about the fact that Ron’s life has been entirely invaded by a woman.

 

**

 

They talk and don’t talk about it:  the fact that Ben kept secrets from her again. They talk about Grist and Leslie explains a hundred times why she knows,  _knows,_ that Harvey Grist isn’t her father. Call it gut or instinct, but she knows. And with enough time Ben stops trying to contradict her. She knows he isn’t convinced, but that is all right. She doesn’t need him to agree with her. She just needs him to trust her. To treat her as an equal.

 

It helps that Ben is almost completely immobilized. His wound was much more than a scratch. Grist had plunged a hunting knife into the underside of Ben’s ribs. The cut wasn’t deep. It didn’t sever the abdominal muscles, but it meant a long healing time. Dr. Harris had given Ben an anti-biotic to ward off infection, but he couldn’t spare painkillers which left Ben feeding off nothing but aspirin.

 

It makes him cranky and Leslie can’t help but torture him a little. She lets Carl in and the deputy keeps Ben busy for a good two hours taking (screaming) about Avatar. When Carl finally leaves she brings him tea laced with whiskey, but Ben is glowering at her.

 

“Are you going to be nice now?” she smiles.

 

“That wasn’t fair. I can’t get away. And you told him I  _wanted_ to discuss Avatar!”

 

Leslie sinks down onto the bed. Her knee brushes Ben’s hip and she hands him his cup. Their fingers brush and Leslie feels something, an electricity, that wasn’t there before. Or hadn’t been there for a long time. In all the months since she found out the truth about Ben there hadn’t been this kind of intimacy between them. It’d been a week since Grist and every night she climbed into the bed with him. Grace slept between them, but there was a physical closeness that hadn’t been there before.

 

She knew the first face he made in the morning and her fingers itched to touch his hair when it stood up on end.

 

Speaking of hair, Leslie thins her lips. There is no way to get around this. It is going to be awkward.

 

“I need to give you a bath.”

 

Ben chokes on his tea, “Excuse me?”

 

“You smell.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“No, seriously. You haven’t bathed in a week. It’s getting unhygienic at this point.”

 

“I can give myself a bath.”

 

“You can’t. You can’t bend over. You can barely lift your hands above your head without pulling on the stiches. I’ve already started warming the water.” She says the last bit quickly.

 

“Seriously?” Ben tips up his eyebrows, “And how are we going to do this?”

 

Since moving into Leslie’s house, they rigged an outdoor shower in the backyard. It collected rainwater and until it became frigid everyone but Grace bathed out there. Once the weather turned they would heat the water up over the outdoor stove and haul it inside. It wasn’t terribly comfortable to give yourself a sponge bath in an empty bathtub, but it worked.

 

“In my shower. That way you can stand and I’ll be able to reach, um,” Leslie swallows, “everything.”

 

Ben’s eyebrows are practically to his hairline. Just like her he is remembering the last time they were in that shower and Leslie tells herself there is no reason to dwell on it. This was just simple business between partners.

 

“I don’t really have a say in this do I?”

 

“You can try to do it on your own, but good luck hauling water and not ripping those stiches. If I do it you’ll get all the way clean.”

 

Ben nods, “You know you’re taking this control thing a little far. I could get Andy to haul the water. He’d do it.”

 

“Andy’s not here. He and April took Grace to the park and then over to,” she shuddered, “the library.”

 

Though it was still a library Leslie hated it less now that it wasn’t run by librarians, all whom deserted Pawnee like the ilk that they are.

 

“So we’re here alone?”

 

“Yup.”

 

“Oh.”

 

And Leslie left him there alone while she went to gather more towels and her nerve.

 

**

 

Leslie had seen Ben shirtless countless times. When he and Andy sparred it was often bareback and once she’d come home to find him asleep on the couch, shirtless, and with Grace on his chest. And there had been more than one awkward interaction in the hallway when Ben came out of the guest bathroom with just a towel around his waist. She’d seen him shirtless countless times. She knew the lean plane of his stomach and the tapered line of muscle.

 

Since coming back to Pawnee, all of them had focused on getting stronger. There were weights in her basement and even Leslie drank a powdered protein shake once a day. Ben is still Ben:  on the skinny side of everything. But he has more bulk, more muscle to him now than the first time she saw him naked when he took her against the wall of her living room.

  
In the bathroom, she helps him pull his t-shirt over his head. They don’t look at one another. She reaches for the band on his sweatpants, but Ben’s fingers catch her wrist. He stops her and when she meets his eye she gets it. He’s going to do it. He isn’t into the idea of being helpless. If this was going to happen he was going to participate.

 

Leslie steps back and watches him push his pants off his hips. He isn’t wearing anything underneath and Leslie swallows hard. He isn’t fully aroused, but it is there if he wanted it to be. When he kicks the pants away, Leslie’s eyes flick up to his and what she sees causes her to stop and consider what she is doing. His jaw is set and he does not blink at her. At first, she is afraid he is mad at her, but she knows better. Ben never did anything Ben didn't want to do. He is looking at her straight on, like standing in the gaze of the sun except Ben isn’t light. He is something else. Something shadowed and darker. She’d never seen his eyes so brown.

 

“Why don’t you get into the shower,” Leslie manages. Ben complies and when she steps in after him, dragging the bucket of steaming water with her, Ben catches her elbow.

 

“You’re going to get your clothes all wet.”

 

“I’ll change later,” Leslie says and closes the shower stall door. The steam rising up from the bucket fogs the shower and Leslie feels enveloped. Ben’s hands find her elbows and he massages the upper parts of her arms. Aware that it is November and the house isn’t heated, Leslie makes fast work of dipping two washcloths into the water and wringing them out. She hands one to Ben and retrieves a bar of soap from the niche in the wall, “Here. Help.”

 

He smirks and Leslie rolls her eyes, “You do smell. This isn’t all pretense.”

 

“You sure know how to win a guy over.”

 

“Like you need winning over,” Leslie mutters. She steps behind him and begins to lather his back. Ben’s hands make quick work of his chest. Both of them give a wide berth to the strips of gauze covering his middle, “You’ve wanted this for months.”

 

“You seem pretty sure of that.”

 

“I’ve seen how you stare at me. And the other day when you walked in on me changing?” She focuses on washing the nape of his neck. Her fingers explore the short hairs on the back of his skull. Ben moans and drops his head forward. It catches Leslie off guard and she stills.

 

“That was an accident. Honest,” he says, “why’d you stop?”

 

“You moaned.”

 

“It felt good.”

 

“It did?” Leslie realizes she has been chewing on her bottom lip.

 

“You’re right. I’ve wanted this for a long time. How about you?” He looks over his shoulder at her.

 

She concentrates on his shoulder blades and runs the washcloth over them, “I’ve thought about it. A few times.”

 

“Ever acted on it?”

 

He is teasing her now and Leslie feels the nerves fall away. This Ben she can handle.

 

“Plenty. Whenever Grace sleeps with you in the office,” she confesses, steps up on tiptoes and whispers in his ear from behind, “You’re great at it. Works every time.”

 

“Christ, Leslie.” Ben coughs and Leslie grins. She comes around front and stands six inches from him. They aren’t touching, but he is hard now. Leslie hands him the washcloth.

 

“Finish up. I’ll be outside.”

 

 ***

Ben gives himself two long exhales to recover. He hunches over in the fogged up shower and tries to steady himself. He has no idea what is happening. Over the last week he has noticed her hands linger longer than they should. But he told himself she was just checking to make sure he was still there. They were friends after all.

 

But they haven’t talked. Not really. Not about where they stand. Ben doesn’t know what this  - the sex – means and part of him is tempted to hold off and demand a conversation. But six months of living with her, sharing a child with her, and being held at arm’s length wins out. Leslie wants to have sex with him. The rest could wait till another time.

 

He makes quick business of washing. He can get everything but his back. The shower had been mostly pretense, but not entirely. Of course Leslie would thread the practical in with seduction.  
  
  
He dries off and when he steps out of the fogged up shower goose bumps trail up and down his arms. He doesn’t stop to consider if it is the cold air or anticipation.

 

She is beneath the two quilts with only the tip of her nose sticking out. She’s lit a candle and this one smells like pine trees. Late afternoon light filters in through the tops of her windows and Ben decides he is going to do this right.

 

He pulls back the covers and chokes out her name when he realizes she is naked under there. He’s seen Leslie’s body before, but it has been a long time. And since the bombs, she's hardened. She is still curve and softness, but like him she is stronger. He kneels on the bed and takes in the mixture of curve and muscle. She stretches out like a cat.

 

“It’s cold,” she mummers and that is all Ben needs to slip down beside her. She curls into him and both of them lie on their hips. Each part of their bodies touch as if greeting one another: knees, thighs, stomachs, and chests. Ben can’t help but smile. Leslie nestles into him, “What?”

 

“This is nice,” he says. He checks the rush of emotions. Those can wait. Right now is all about sensation.

 

“It is,” she winds her arms around him. Her hip bumps against him and her legs part. His cock finds the space there and rubs against her, “I’ve thought about this,” she says, “I’ll be on top. That way you won’t strain your stitches too much.”

 

Ben flexes and it calls a sigh out of her, “Sounds like you have a plan.”

 

“I always have a plan.”

  
  
“Aren’t you sensitive?” he chokes as his tip pressed against her opening.

 

“I’m primed,” she grins and pushes down. He enters her and she is so tight and wet. He tries to thrust, but pain rips through him. Leslie pushes down on his chest, “My turn to do the work,” she says.

 

Ben watches Leslie ride him. She has a fine hand, her thrusts alternate between slow and long, fast and hard. She builds both of them and Ben does everything he can to participate, but there is something about watching her. She focuses on them together like she does everything: with intense concentration and an attention to detail. And when Ben doesn’t think he can hold back, when the sensations are building he clutches for her.

 

Ben holds on. He arches his head and feels her thrust down on him once, twice, and finally on the third time it sends both of them over. She bends down over him and kisses him Nothing could be more perfect.

 

**

 

April catches Grace at the bottom of the slide and twirls her in a fast spin. Grace giggles and April holds the baby against her chest.

 

“Babe, watch Champion go down the slide,” Andy calls out.

 

April smiles as Andy and Champion slowly creak down the yellow plastic slide.

 

“Deeee,” Grace calls out her name for Andy.

 

“You’re right Dee,” April snuggles her face into the curve of Grace’s shoulder. Grace and Andy and Champion are the only people April lets herself do that with. She has no interest in lingering in the space where she cares too much. But with them she can’t help it.

 

She holds Grace tighter because April is afraid. The day Grist showed up April had been filing paperwork in Leslie’s office and watching Grace. Only Leslie would keep records through the apocalypse. Grace played in her playpen and April had let her mind wander when a sensation crept down her spine. She could only describe it as fear. Ben told her once, when they had gone out into the woods to practice shooting, that it was intuition.

 

It was that feeling that had sent her running to the front steps of Pioneer Hall in time to see Ben walking away with Chris and Grist. But that wasn’t what scared her.

 

It was the man she found holding Grace when she came back to the Parks office. He was tall and grey haired. He wore a leather jacket and Grace looked right at home in his arms.  
  
  
That was the problem with Grace. She went to anyone. He didn’t see April at first. He was talking to Grace in low tones. She was playing with a rattle.  
  
  
April stopped in the doorway and drew her gun “Put her down.”

 

The man turned and April almost dropped her weapon. Staring at her were eyes the same shade of blue as Leslie and Grace. The man was calm and put Grace back into her playpen. He ruffled the little girl’s hair and stepped away. April put herself between Grace and the man, her gun held out, but he was already leaving.

 

“I was just stopping through and saw she was alone. You shouldn’t leave a baby alone,” he said, “and don’t ever point a gun at her again. No matter who has her.” It was a warning delivered with little effort.

 

And then he was gone and April realized that she had to get Grace out of there. She had to follow the plan.

 

Since then April has told herself a hundred times the man just stopped by the office and noticed a baby left alone. That he hadn’t been looking for Leslie or for Grace. She told herself Grist was the threat.  
  
  
She told herself she knew what she was doing.

***

_How do you fall in love when the world is falling already?_

  


 

The weeks Leslie Knope spends at home taking care of Ben and making out with his face confirm what she has feared for a long time. She never had a type until Ben Wyatt. Now her type is skinny, dorky state-auditor-really-secret-agent-man. It is a specific type, but lucky for Leslie she knows the perfect candidate.

 

_Are they dating?_

 

Leslie wants to talk to Ann so badly it hurts. She carries on pretend conversations with the beautiful, wise mussel every day. When Ben makes her laugh. When he gets up before she does to calm Grace. When he laces his fingers through her’s as they read by candle light in the living room. Each time Leslie presses her eyes shut and wishes she could confer with her best friend.

 

_What is this? Is it wise?_

 

She watches him with Grace and thinks maybe they could be a family, but this is dangerous thinking. This isn’t her life. In all of these months Leslie still hasn’t accepted what has happened. She keeps a tally of everything she’s done that the real Leslie Knope would never do, the things she’s done to survive. To help Pawnee survive. She adds them up in the notebook and hides the thing in the back of her bathroom vanity. At night when he’s asleep in her bed she slips into Ben’s room and reads the entries:

 

_Stealing the casket for Jean-Ralphio._

_Dreaming of putting a bullet in Harvey Grist’s temple._

_Wondering if Harvey Grist could really be her father._

  
_Not writing Tom to tell him about Jean-Ralphio_.

 

The last one is the hardest. She meets Ron in the dry river bed. Normally it is Ben, but he can’t traverse the woods and if they send no one then everyone at the cabin will worry and Leslie can’t let that happen. She tells Ron about Grist and Jean-Ralphio and then she leaves it up to him to tell Tom. She opts out and that is not Leslie.

 

It hurts too damn much. Hurts in the same way her mother’s death still hurts. In the way the scarred Pawnee streets hurt. Without running water she can’t hide the sadness beneath the steady stream of a shower. With Ben in her bed she can’t hide in her bathroom either. So she retreats to Ben’s room and curls up in his sheets, which she realizes smell like him. And even though he is in the next room she just can’t bring herself to fall apart in front of him. Because if she falls apart there is a chance he will be wonderful and then she’ll love him and he’ll be taken from her too.

 

But see the problem is Leslie has a type now. Ben Wyatt is her type and she’s got a life with him, a family, even if how they came together was strange and imperfect. Even if Grace isn’t her biological daughter, Leslie can’t help thinking like a mother. She watches Ben and realizes that never once has he blinked at the responsibility of this little girl. Even when he and Leslie weren’t a thing, he and Grace were. The fact that he loves the one thing she can’t help but love, the one person for whom love tumbles recklessly out of her heart, the fact that he loves Grace independent of Leslie is the first reason why she begins to fall in love with him.

 

It means that this is her life now. She is the Leslie Knope falling in love with Ben Wyatt. And she is going to have to accept it.

 

**

 

Ben’s first night back on duty as sheriff leaves him coming home well past midnight. He picks his way past April and Andy, who are asleep in a pillow fort set-up in the living room, and upstairs to Leslie and Grace.

 

His wound doesn’t hurt, but Ben rubs it absently before he pushes the bedroom door open. Now that he was healed, did Leslie want him to sleep in his own bed?

 

He knows she sneaks in there sometimes. He can hear her crying, but he doesn’t intrude. He knows more than anyone else the importance of privacy, especially in circumstances like these, where they are living on top of each other. But her crying alone when he is right there in the bed with her tells him the distance between them is still very wide.

 

He pushes aside his doubts, his frustrations for not having actually talked about it with Leslie, their relationship, yet. He’d been happy to let the weeks slip by in a blissful bubble. And tonight he pushes them aside one more time and steps into the bedroom.

 

Leslie is a lump in the middle of the bed. It is almost December and with no heat the nights are frigid. There is a fireplace in the living room and Ben knows it is only a matter of time before they join Andy and April in front of it. But for now they have been making do with quilts, flannel sheets, and body heat. At night they cocoon Grace between them. It doesn’t let for sexy times, but it is blissfully domestic in a way Ben didn’t realize he yearned for until he had it.

 

He unlaces his boots. Since the weather turned cold each night there is a uniform to bed: flannel pajamas, wool socks, zip up hoodie, and on the most bitter nights knit caps on their heads. Ben tells himself that it is too cold for sex anyway; it is what he tells himself when he holds Leslie through all those layers. He repeats it when his hand finds the curve of her waist. Too cold for sex.

 

“Hey,” he whispers as he slides into the bed. Leslie turns toward him and in that second Ben realizes Grace isn’t there.

 

“She’s sleeping with Andy and April,” Leslie mutters. Her fingers are making quick work of the buttons on his pajama shirt, but Ben curls his hands around hers. Stops her.

 

“Is that safe?”

 

“No one is going to get through April. You’ve seen how protective she’s been since Grist,” Leslie says. Ben wishes he could see her, but the moon is weak tonight, “Besides it’s warmer down there, with the fire,” she tugs on Ben’s shirt and he finally lets go of her hands, “Come on, honey. You’re letting all the warmth out.”

 

And he slips down alongside her and it takes all of half a second for Leslie to resume her quick work of the buttons on his shirt.

 

“Les,” he grits through chattering teeth, “Can you just wait a few minutes until I warm up?”

 

“I’ve been waiting for you for hours,” she presses kisses along his neck and Ben’s hands finally wind themselves around her. When he does he realizes that Leslie isn’t wearing pants. It is just her flannel pajama shirt, underwear, and when her feet twine with his he realizes thick wool socks. His brain shorts out and his breath stops. Leslie laughs into his chest, “I was wondering when you’d notice. I’m practically naked here.”

 

“How are you not frozen?” His hands wander down the back of her thighs and up her ass. Most of their sex has come in stolen afternoons, quick nooners between Leslie’s mayorial duties and his sheriff ones. They were quick and hot and heavy. But he never got to touch her enough, to languish in the softness of her skin and curve of her body.

 

Leslie giggles and Ben presses a quick kiss to her lips. He hooks his hands beneath her knees and with a roll brings her on top of him, straddling his hips, and landing right on what is quickly becoming a very hard boner. She nips at his neck while returning to the task of getting his shirt off. Oh well, he figures, if she is going to freeze for the chance of long, fantastic sex then so should he.

 

They make out, grinding hips against one another, sighing and gasping as hands find just the right spot. Ben pulls Leslie’s shirt off and Leslie pulls the quilts all the way over their heads so they are tented in their own heat and darkness.

 

“What do you want, baby?” Ben presses his lips to her ear. Leslie is wearing nothing but her underwear and socks. His hands keep busy trying to touch every inch of her. He wants her to be hot and relaxed. When they land on the small of her back and press them even closer together Leslie moans and he gets it, “You want me inside you?”

 

“Yes,” she says and then her hands inch up to the scar under his ribs, “and I want you to fuck me really hard Ben cause you can. I want you to fill me up.”

 

“Shit, Leslie,” he says, “you are so hot.”

 

Ben rolls her onto her back and makes his way down her body with his lips. It is hard with the quilts over their heads, but Leslie uses her hands to hold them up a bit and Ben won’t lie it is totally hot to be doing this in the dark. Everything is sensation and his cock is practically throbbing from the stimulation. He takes his time to suck on her tits, pull on the nipples with his teeth just the tiniest bit, and bury his head between her breasts.

 

“I could spend all day right here,” he mutters and Leslie gives a lazy sigh of approval.

 

He wanders further down until he gets to the elastic of her underwear. He wonders which pair she is wearing, but it doesn’t matter because they are coming off. She curls her legs up to help him get them off her and then the underwear disappear somewhere into the mess of blankets. Ben stops her right ankle and presses a kiss to the inside. It is a foolish flutter of lips, something he does on a whim, but it causes Leslie to cry out and he stops.

 

“Are you okay?” he asks. The inside of her ankles was not an usual turn on.

 

“Yeah,” her breath hitches and Ben realizes she is crying. He climbs back up her body to lean on his elbows and lower his forehead to hers.

 

“Talk to me,” he kisses her nose and she only cries harder, “You can talk to me.”

 

She presses the back of her hand to her mouth and tries to stiffle the break in her voice, “I can’t. I really can’t.”

 

“Leslie,” he frowns and rolls off her. He gathers her so that they are pressed front to front and he hooks a leg over her hip. His hands splay over the back of her neck and head until she is held tightly against him, “Leslie you can tell me anything.”

 

“Why do you have to be so good?”

 

“Good at what?”

 

“At the details. You pay attention to the details.”

 

Ben really isn’t sure what she is talking about so he kisses her on the forehead, on the cheeks, tastes the saltiness of her tears on his tongue, and ends on her lips. She lets him kiss her and when he is done he pulls back a centimeter and waits for her. He waits for her to speak again.

 

“I’m afraid to fall in love with you,” she finally says and Ben closes his eyes. This is why they haven’t had the conversation. This is why she cries alone in the other room. He wonders what to say. He isn’t even sure what he wants to happen here and so Ben opts for the truth. Since telling her everything once he keeps coming back to that stance. Just keep telling Leslie the truth because it is all he has to offer.

 

“I might be falling in love with you.”

 

“Have you fallen all the way?”

 

Ben smiles. Of course Leslie would want to be exact even in a conversation about feelings. He is a numbers guy. He can appreciate that even if it seems unrealistic.

 

“Not sure yet,” with two fingers he tips her chin up so that even if he can’t see her eyes he knows they are directed at him, “but I do know it scares me.”

 

“I’m afraid I’ll lose you if I love you.”

 

That, Ben realizes, is a hell of a lot better than what he thought she was afraid of. He feared that her fear was born out of distrust. That though she trusted him with Grace, her heart was still out-of-bounds. He also knows there is no way, especially in the world they live in, for there to be any guarantees. Loss was a reality.

 

“How about,” Ben says very slowly, “we promise to only start to fall in love,” he kisses the curve of her jaw and then her cheek and her nose, “No soul mates or death do us part stuff. How about we just stick to I love you and I like you.” His lips hover over hers and Ben prays silently that she’ll say yes.

 

And after the longest second of his life, Leslie presses her lips to his. Her mouth opens under his and their kiss slips like a from sweet to something deeper, something akin to a vow or a promise or a pledge. It slips and he and Leslie slip with it.

 

**

 

“I think we should go up to the cabin for Christmas,” April says through a mouth full of cereal the next morning. The Trix are stale, but they are what they have and April likes to have cereal for breakfast. It reminds of her of before, of her mom in her hideous bathrobe, and it makes everything feel more normal than it really is.

 

Andy spoons oatmeal into Grace’s mouth and whatever she doesn’t eat he licks off. Ben looks up from the book he is reading and reads April’s expression to see she is serious or not. She is. He picks up his coffee cup and sips it silently. April knows that means he is thinking about it.

 

Leslie leans against the counter and frowns, “We can’t just leave town. It’d look suspicious.”

 

“We tell everyone we’re going to Muncie to look for Jerry’s daughters. We got wind they might be there,” April says.

 

Ben leans forward, “You’ve thought about this?”

 

“I still think it is too risky,” Leslie shakes her head. She turns away to refill her cup as if even that simple gesture can dismiss April’s idea.

 

April shrugs, “Fine. Don’t. We’ll spend Christmas here with just the five of us as if it were any old night. Let Grace have her first Christmas be without the rest of her family.” She slumps down into her chair and plays with the ends of her hair.

 

Ben and Leslie share a look and she hopes it is working, the pouting. She can’t tell them about that morning Grist showed up so did another man, someone she’d never seen before. And even though it is likely he was just another Pawnee citizen - there were a couple thousand of them and she hardly knew anyone - he didn’t feel like just another citizen. He felt dangerous.

 

And every instinct in her screams to get Grace out of here, to seek higher ground, and go after him. Find out who he was. And April has every intention of doing that. But first she needs Grace - she needs all of them really - safely at the cabin.

 

But Ben looks at April and then Leslie and back to April, “I agree with Leslie. As much as I would like to spend Christmas with everyone it would be too dangerous.”

 

**

 

As Christmas approaches Leslie and Ben move downstairs to sleep. Winter hangs over Pawnee like a tempestuous witch, creaking and dangerous. They make a nest of quilts and sleeping bags, but opt out of a pillow fort. The wind whips against their cheeks. It stings their eyes until they tear and freezes the tears to their skin like diamonds. It is so cold no one feels capable of cheer and merriment, but Leslie tries to make it festive. It is Grace’s first Christmas.

 

She hangs pine branches over windows. She digs out her ornaments and they trim a tree while Andy strums  _Santa Baby_ on his guitar because it is the only Christmas song he knows. Leslie crafts everyone a stocking and she hangs them beside her own - one Marlene made for her as a kid - and stops when she sees them all there strung up together. She realizes she has a family now.

 

But she also has lost people.

 

She pushes the memories of Christmas away. She tries to forget that Christmas was the last holiday she had with her dad before he left, that after that he would always send a taxi cab full of presents to her, and that the candy she got at Christmas always reminded her of him. He had been a candy salesman. Sugar naturally ran in her blood.

 

Yet, if Ben is right her father might be Harvey Grist, the man who destroyed the world. Or at least her country and her home.

 

But Ben is wrong. He said it himself. There are holes in his story. How could Grist pull off something like this alone?

 

He had a partner, a man much lower in the agency, who Ben dismissed as a lackey. The partner had been a handler while Grist was a field agent. They worked together briefly at the beginning of their careers before diverting onto wildly different paths. The only reason to think they might be working together now was because they had both quit the agency around the same time. Ben is sure Grist recruited his old friend and the man would be of little help even if they knew where to find him. Who knew if he was even alive? Most of Ben’s files had been destroyed when the Pawnee Super Suites burned in the wake of the bombs. All they had to go on was Ben’s memory.

 

A memory that even Ben is beginning to doubt. Grist had been right - the pieces didn’t add up. He and Leslie talk in circles trying to figure it out. She points out they know very little about Grist, Chris seemed to trust him, and that Jean-Ralphio’s death had been an accident.

 

“Tell me what he did when you said I was his daughter?” Leslie asked tucked into the curve of his arm. They were hiding in her bedroom and ignoring the cold.

 

“He laughed like a maniac.”

 

“Could mean it surprised him, the thought that I was his daughter,” she offers.

 

“Or it could mean that he is crazy,” Ben presses his lips to her neck, “He kept talking about needing to know Grace was alright. That he was just there to get a look at her.”

 

Leslie exhales. That is the one thing she can’t explain away. Grist is connected to Grace and no matter who he is or what he did or didn’t do that fact alone scares her.

 

“Thank goodness he didn’t get near her,” Leslie says to Ben, “That no one did.”

 

Grist is not her father, Leslie decides, for she lost her father a long time ago. He was like Santa, a man who gave her toys and candy, but whom eventually she stopped believing in.

 

***

 

“I miss Ann,” Leslie lays on her belly next to Grace who is rolling and laughing at herself.

 

Ben reads on the couch and it is just the three of them in the shadow of the Christmas tree. Andy and April are taking Champion for a walk and there had been talk of a snowball fight which Ben is glad Leslie opted out of. He is tired.

 

There has been an increase in looting since he recovered. People’s supplies are running low and with winter set in people feel trapped. It is one thing to loot from abandoned homes, but now he and Andy are looking into break-ins of occupied homes.

 

With every citizen armed and only a handful of deputies there is little Ben can do. But he knows that the appearance of control was almost more important than their effectiveness.

 

But he pushes all of that aside right now because he is at home - or the closest he’s had to a home since leaving Partridge - and Leslie is smiling sadly up at him. Grace shrieks with pleasure when she successfully pulls herself up on Leslie’s back.

 

“Are you climbing on Mommy?” Leslie twists and captures Grace around the waist. They roll and Leslie settles Grace onto her stomach. Grace looks up at Ben and shrieks again a glee-filled sound, “Mommy’s going to get you!” Leslie sits up and attacks Grace with kisses. The baby laughs and Ben scoots off the couch to join them on the floor.

 

“Da, Da, Da!” she giggles and reaches for him, but Ben takes a turn at planting kisses on her cheeks, neck, and tummy. Grace squirms away, but Ben captures her again and holds her while Leslie blasts raspberries on her stomach.

 

After a minute they let up and Grace crawls away. She is walking now, but when needing to make a quick escape opts for all fours. She hovers near the edge of the fireplace, shifting back and forth. She gives them a toothy grin and eyes the flames.

 

“Grace, you know better,” Leslie warns. But there is an impish grin and a lunge and Ben has never been more thankful for quick reflexes. He scoops the baby up just before her hand wanders too close to the flames. It startles her and she starts to cry and Ben tucks her into the curve of his shoulder.

 

Leslie looks annoyed as Ben sinks back down to the floor. Grace hides her face from her mother in Ben’s sweater and sucks her thumb.

 

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Leslie says.

 

“And let her burn herself?”

 

“I was close enough. I wouldn’t let her actually hurt herself, but she needs to understand that the fire is dangerous. The only way she’s going to get it is if she tests it,” Leslie sighs.

 

“She’s a baby!”

 

“She’s smart.”

 

“She’s stubborn,” Ben raises an eyebrow, “like you.”

 

Leslie thins her lips. It was one of her least favorite topics - how much alike she and Grace were, how much Grace resembled Leslie at that age, and how they might be related. It just drove home the idea that Grist could be her father.

 

Ben lets it drop because he hasn’t forgotten her comment from a few minutes before. The thing about missing Ann. That is new.

 

“You’re okay letting her burn herself on a fire, but you think it is too dangerous to take her to the cabin for Christmas?” Ben tests the waters.

 

Leslie sits up and tucks her legs to her chest, “That cabin is the ace up our sleeve. If Grist comes back it is the one place we can hide her. I think it is stupid to risk someone following us there just because we want some holiday comfort.”

 

“And it has nothing to do with Ann?”

 

Ben remembers the fight the two women had before they left for Pawnee. Everyone over heard them on the front porch of Ron’s cabin. Ann accused Leslie of being selfish, of needing to be the hero, and at the end when Ann refused to leave the cabin, Leslie had called her a coward. It stopped everyone, Leslie included, in her tracks and no matter how many times she apologized Ann refused to look her in the eye.

 

“I’m not afraid of Ann.”

 

“I think you’re afraid of Ann not forgiving you.”

 

“She told me I was trying to steamroll everyone into coming back to Pawnee as if it weren’t the right thing to do.”

 

“It was the right thing for you to do,” Ben reminds her gently, “but civic duty isn’t high on people’s priority list right now. And for good reason.”

 

Leslie looks insulted, “You came back!”

 

“I followed you and Grace here. To protect you. Not because I thought it was a good idea. We disagreed quite a bit on that decision if you don’t remember.”

 

She smiles reluctantly, “I still have my veto.”

 

“And I have mine.”

 

Leslie picks at lint on her socks. Ben tightens his grip on Grace and watches the way the fire backlit Leslie’s hair. Grace was willful and stubborn and whether it was genetic or not, she got it from Leslie. But they were also beautiful and precious and happy in a world that was none of those things. The sound of their laughter filled him with hope and despite his promise to Leslie to hold off falling in love with her, he already had. Irrevocably so.

 

“Hey,” he reaches for and circles her ankle with his free hand, “She hasn’t stopped being your best friend. You’re not going to lose her.”

 

And the fierce look she gives him, a steady thankfulness for him, for Grace, for  _them_ , tells him she has already broken that promise too.

***

A few days later Leslie finds Ben at the desk he keeps at Pioneer Hall.

  


There are only a few rooms with working fireplaces and they’ve shoved desks into them so everyone is bundled in together. He is scratching notes into the daily log he keeps, noting the complaints with an accountant’s thoroughness. She stops and wonders if he would have become an accountant if he had never joined the FBI. In a certain light, under different circumstances, it made sense.

 

“Hey,” she drags a chair over to his desk, “I brought lunch.”

 

She unpacks the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Strawberry for her and marmalade for Ben. Ben liked marmalade. He liked comic books and marmalade. The stuff old English women had at tea.

 

“Your crumpet dear sir,” she says in her best British accent as she hands him his sandwich, Ben raises an eyebrow brow, but smiles as he takes a bite. Leslie laughs and it is sharp against otherwise silent office. A few people look toward them, but it only makes her giggle harder.

 

“You know what would make this perfect?” Ben says, “A good strong stout.”

 

“Beer with a peanut butter sandwich?”

 

“At this point a beer would be perfect with just about anything.”

 

Alcohol was one of the first things to go in Pawnee. People had stores of it still tucked away, but it was not readily available. A few enterprising folks built distilleries and sold moonshine, but it was nothing like a good beer. Leslie liked her drinks fruity and pink, but she knows Ben misses being able to have a beer at the end of the day. They all had something they missed acutely, something small and ordinary, that reminded them of times before. For Andy it was jamming out with his band. For April it was texting. And for Leslie it waffles from JJ’s. Nothing she made on the camp stove could compare.

 

“Busy day?” Leslie says between bites.

 

Ben rubs his temple, “We’ve got more looting. I’ve got to head out to the Snakehole to talk to Sewage Joe.”

 

“Why him?”

 

“Cause a few people told me he’s the guy to talk to if you need something. And anyone who knows how to find that many things has to be connected to the looting.”

 

“Smart.”

 

“That’s what they pay me for,” Ben says and they both snort cause neither of them are getting paid anything. Not unless you count in vegetables from Tanya, the salad lady.

 

“So I have an idea,” Leslie smiles.

 

“And here I thought you trying to get a date out of me,” Ben winks.

 

“That would be nice, a date,” Leslie muses.

 

“Say the word and I’ll plan something.”

 

“Really?”

 

He pulls her hand across the desk and interlocks their fingers, “Yes. Even if there is a madman out there gunning for us and we have no heat and we’re living with Andy and April, I will always find time to take you out on a date. Always.”

 

She laughs again, quietly this time and scoots forward so their faces are just a few inches apart. She doesn’t care that Joan Calamenzo rolls her eyes a few desks away or that Carl is shouting to someone about Avatar. She only has eyes for Ben and his terrible face parts.

 

“I’m going to take you up on that promise after the holidays,” she presses her forehead to his.

 

“I look forward to it,” he says and steals a kiss, “Now what is your idea.”

 

“I think we should throw Grace a birthday party.”

 

Whatever he was anticipating it wasn’t this and he frowns, “But we don’t know when her birthday is.”

 

Leslie looks over her shoulder. No one is paying any attention to them. She drops her voice, “We don’t know what her real name is.”

 

Ben exhales, “And a kid’s gotta have a birthday.”

 

“Ann said she was probably six months old this past spring which means that she’s probably about a year now. She’s walking now and feeding herself. And she’s stringing words together. She said  _Mama gooo Dada bababab_  the other day.”

 

Ben smiles, “And that means?”

 

“Mama good. Dada bad,” Leslie deadpans.

 

“Of course.”

 

“The point is she’s growing up and everything I’ve read about childhood development tells me she is nearing a year-old. She deserves a birthday party.”

 

Ben holds up both hands, “Leslie I’m not arguing with you,” he stops and sighs, “I guess it just makes this all feel very permanent.”

 

This catches her off guard, but Ben sees the flicker of fear in her eyes because he grabs onto her hand and won’t let go, “And that is a _good_ thing, Les. I want this - me, you, and Grace - to be permanent, but I just wonder if the looking over our shoulders and constantly worrying is permanent too. I’d like to exhale for once.”

 

“Well consider her birthday party us exhaling.”

 

Ben bites his lip, “What if we had her birthday with the rest of her family? At the cabin like April suggested?”

 

“I know you think it can be done safely,” Leslie says, “but I’ll use my veto if I have too. It’s too dangerous.”

 

He nods, “You don’t have to use your veto. I think it would be good for Andy and April. And for you. They’re the family you have left and you haven’t seen them in months.”

 

“I have you and Grace.”

 

He smiles, “And I want you to have  _all_  of the people you care in your life. Think about it, okay?”

 

She presses her lips to his because she suddenly has another idea, “I promise.”

 

***

 

Ann is determined to turn Ron’s cabin into a Christmas wonderland. He cut the damn tree down himself and brought her pine boughs to rope into garland which she hung on the mantle. At night, after everyone else has gone to sleep, he whittles ornaments from scraps of wood, woodland creatures and stars. And he isn’t going to complain about the baking she and Donna set to doing. But he’d be damned if he let her turn his fishing lures into ornaments.

 

“What’s wrong with them?” she protests, “They’re bright and festive and already have hooks.”

 

“They are for fishing which I do to catch food that you eat.”

 

“And they’ll go right back to being fishing lures after Christmas!”

 

“I don’t see the harm Ron,” Jerry offers, but both Ann and Ron silence him with a look.

 

“You two need to get a room,” Donna barely looks up from her romance novel. Ron shudders. There are books with half naked men on their covers littering his house. He caught Tom reading one the other day and both of them silently agreed not to mention it.

 

If Ann notices Donna’s comment then she doesn’t give any indication. She moves past him toward the stairs to the loft where Tom and Jerry slept. But Ron does notice and  it makes him clear his throat and look at the floor.

 

But when he hears her pushing against the crawl space door he forgets about the comment.

 

“What are you doing?” he follows her up there but Ann has already disappeared into the dark space.

 

“I thought there might be something up here we could use,” she called back.

 

Ron follows her on his hands and knees, “There is nothing back here except Swanson family keepsakes. Is there no such thing as privacy anymore?”

 

“Was this your toy growing up?” Ann holds up stuffed dog in the beam of her flashlight.

 

Ron stutters, “That is Rolf and he was not a toy. He was a companion.”

 

She cocks her head and smiles, “I bet at some point you were kind of sweet, Ron.”

 

“I was not sweet,” he blusters, “I was Ron Fucking Swanson.”

 

***

 

Leslie knows she shouldn’t take Grace to the Snakehole, but now is the only chance she is going to get between now and the birthday party and it happens to be her turn to watch Grace. So against her better judgement she packs a diaper bag with fruit snacks and her gun. She straps Grace into the carrier front-pack carrier, keeping her close, and uses a little of their precious gas to drive out to the Snakehole.

 

Without the pounding music or flashing lights, the bar is dark and depressing. Still people gather there to drink and commiserate. Leslie steps into the place and for a second is glad Tom and Donna aren’t here to see what has happened to this place. But then people see her and Grace and they get quiet and all thoughts shoot out of her brain except one.

 

This was a bad idea.

 

Everyone is quiet and Leslie realizes she doesn’t know a single citizen in the place. They know her though and the way they look at her makes her pull her coat over Grace as if that could shield her.

 

Sewage Joe is behind the bar and he is sporting a fat lip and blackening eye. Leslie straightens her chin and reminds herself this is a simple transaction. There is no reason for this to get ugly.

 

“Like what you’ve done with the place,” Leslie says as she slips onto a bar stool.

 

Joe leans onto the bar, “Are you here to give me more shit like your boyfriend? Going on about property rights and being neighborly. Fucking nonsense.”

 

It doesn’t take a genius to guess where the fat lip and black eye came from.

 

“I just want to know where I can get some beer,” Leslie slips the pack of batteries she brought with her onto the bar. Something like a pack of double A batteries was good as gold in Pawnee and thanks to Leslie’s hoarding habits they were well stocked through the next decade. Not that anyone else needed to know that.

 

Joe laughs and looks at the guy down the bar, “She wants to know where she can buy beer. Like if I had some beer I wouldn’t have already sold it.”

 

The guy laughs too, but it is a nervous laugh. Leslie is the mayor and she does have a baby strapped to her chest.

 

“If you don’t have any then I’ll just get going,” she says carefully and starts to stand, but Joe’s hand is fast and he catches her wrist and the batteries tight against the bar.

 

“How about you leave those for all the pain and suffering your boyfriend caused me today?”

 

And the normal Leslie would, the Leslie from a year ago who made pro and con lists before making big decisions, but that Leslie did not exist anymore. Could not exist.

 

“I’m going to give you three seconds to let go of me,” she says without breaking eye contact with Joe. She doesn’t remember much about the man from before the bombs. He was gross and lewd and she avoided everything about him. But now there is something in his eyes, a haunted hounded look, that scares her. In this world he is someone with little to lose.

 

He purses his lips and laughs,“Or what?”

 

And Leslie raises her gun in a single, steady motion. She remembers what Ben taught her. There is a difference between shooting someone and shooting to kill, but never point a gun at someone unless you are prepared to kill them. She aims the gun right between the eyes, “Back off.”

 

And that is enough. Joe releases her hand and Leslie takes the batteries and backs away. She holds the gun steady until she is out the door and in the parking lot where she finally drops her arm. Grace, asleep, makes a noise against her chest and Leslie closes her eyes.

 

“You know you should never handle a gun around a baby,” the voice scares her and Leslie turns as a man walks out of the Snakehole. He is old with white hair and he wears a leather jacket.

 

She takes a step back, “I don’t want trouble.”

 

He holds both hands up, “And I’m not looking for it,” he smiles an easy smile and looks at the gun still in her hand, “Why don’t you put that back in your diaper bag?”

 

She doesn’t, but keeps the weapon at her side, “Who are you?”

 

“Name is Brad Zale,” the man says, “I heard you were looking for some beer.”

 

“What’s it to you?”

 

He puts his hands in his pockets, “Sewage Joe isn’t the only guy around town who knows a bit about the black market.”

 

“I don’t want anything illegal.”

 

He laughs, “What’s legal nowadays?”

 

“I don’t want anything you stole from someone.”

 

“Nah, this stuff comes from my own stock. Can have it. I’ve got plenty of batteries.”

 

Leslie looks at him again. He is tall and broad shouldered. Even in old age it is apparent that he is not to be taken lightly.

 

“I’ve never seen you before,” she says, “Why should I trust you?”

 

“I live a ways out of Pawnee, but I’m from around here. Raised a family here.”

 

She shifts on her feet, “And why are you willing to just give me beer?”

 

He scratches his jaw, “I like the look of your kid. What’s her name?”

 

Leslie bites on her lip, but she knows it isn’t some big secret. Anyone with eyes would know Grace belonged to Leslie.

 

“Grace.”

 

“Grace, huh. Nice name. Suits her. Seems like a good baby.”

 

Leslie touches Grace’s curls, steadies herself by doing that, “She is. The best.”

 

The man smiles, “I’ll bring some by Pioneer Hall tomorrow.”

 

“Thank you,” she slips the gun into her diaper bag, “Really. We’re having this birthday party for Grace and I wanted to do something special for Ben too cause he’s been so great. Thank you. It’ll make his day.”

 

“A birthday party even in the midst of all this?”

 

She shrugs, “Milestones are even more important now.”

 

The man nods and starts back toward the bar, but stops at the door, “If you ever need something else you can’t find, Leslie Knope, let me know. I can find anything. It’s what I do.”

 

***

 

The birthday party is a wild success. Andy presents Grace with a one-of-a-kind Mouserat onsie he and April made with a permeant marker and modgepodge. Never mind that they’d never be able to wash it. It was perfect. Neighbors brought toys their kids used to use and the people at Pioneer Hall contributed a cake. They used the Rec center and Ben took turns with Perd Hapley at the grill, which was laden with the latest venison burgers from Ron. There was face painting and Leslie presented the quilt she made for Grace.

 

Amid the noise, Leslie pulls Ben into a hall and presents him with the beer. She refuses to give up her methods and finds herself pressed against a wall. He kisses her hard and Leslie wants to melt into him. They steal a few minutes to wrap themselves around one another and when he finally breaks away he kisses the tip of her nose, “You are going to split one with me. Later tonight.”

 

“It takes more than half a beer to get me drunk,” she teases.

 

Ben leans in and whispers right above her ear, “You’re going to want to be a little drunk for what I’ve got in mind.”

 

And at the end of the day once everyone had gone and everything was cleaned up they had one happy, tired baby. Ben carried her in from the car and Leslie took as many of the presents as she could muster. Andy and April followed with their own loads and Champion ran between their feet.

 

“Leslie, do you think we could go sledding tomorrow?” Andy pipes up, “Cause I know Grace and Champion want to go.”

 

“Is there a sledding hill in Pawnee?” Ben stops and looks at Leslie. April pushes past them because it is cold and she hates the cold.

 

“Yeah. Nipple Hill.”

 

“Why is it called Nipple Hill?”

 

“Well it goes back to -,”

 

But there is a crash and they look at April who has dropped her armful of toys and has pulled a gun at the ajar front door. Ben starts to hand Grace to Lesie, to go for his own gun, but the door creaks open and a figure steps into the moonlight and onto the porch.

 

It is Ron. A weary, somber Ron.

 

“What’s going on?” This comes from Leslie though she doesn’t remember saying it.

 

Ron’s voice cracks, “It’s Ann. She’s dying.”

***

“Wh…what?” Leslie stumbles. The ground has opened up beneath her, a gaping hole of earth, black and crumbling, and Leslie is sure she is falling even though she is standing still.

 

Ben is there with a hand at her elbow. She clutches Grace’s gifts and suddenly the happy afternoon seems very far away, like a light at the end of a distant hall. Ann.  _Ann._ She tries to catch her voice, steady it, but it wobbles out, “Wh…wha…what?”

Ron raises a hand to his temple, but seems to forget why and drops it by his side, “Last week she was decorating for Christmas. She went up into the crawl space to look for decorations. I was with her. Giving her hell. She cut herself on a rusty nail. Didn’t even tell me about it for days. She spiked a temperature and we thought she might have the flu, but then two days ago she started spasming.”

 

 

 

“Tetanus?” It is Ben. His voice is calm and Leslie wants to turn on him, demand how he could remain calm at a time like this. It is Ann.  _Ann._

 

 

 

Ron nods, “She thinks so.”

 

 

 

“Isn’t she vaccinated?”

 

 

 

“She was supposed to get a booster sometime in the last year and just never got around to it.”

 

 

 

“Okay. Okay. Okay,” Leslie forces herself to steady now. On every exhale she keeps repeating the word as if that will make it be true, “Okay. Okay.”

 

 

 

“Leslie, you all right?” Andy says. She turns numbly toward him. He stands a few feet from her, holding onto Champion’s collar, and looks at her with round eyes.

 

 

 

“Andy, it is Ann we need to be worried about. But it is Ann,” there is panic in her voice and her arms just give out. The toys bounce on the ground, but she doesn’t notice, “It’s Ann and she is a beautiful musk ox. She can’t die or be hurt because last time we talked I called her a coward and she can’t die because she is Ann. Do you remember Ann, Andy? You used to love her.”

 

 

 

“Leslie?” Ben grips her more tightly now, but Leslie pushes him away.

 

 

 

“Andy, do you remember being in love with Ann?” Leslie yells.

 

 

 

Andy shifts on his feet, “I’ll always love her. She’s A-cakes.” He looks at April when he says it and she nods. It is okay. Right now anything is okay.

 

 

 

“Okay.” Leslie paces now, shaking her arms out, and looks at no one, “Okay. Okay. Okay.”

 

 

 

“Leslie, let’s go inside,” Ben tries to catch her around the shoulders, but she sidesteps him. She thinks vaguely someone should take the sleeping baby inside before she freezes, but somehow her tongue is too thick to form the words _._

 

 

 

“Okay. Okay. Okay.”  _Please be okay._

 

 

 

“That’s enough!” Ron grabs her, shakes her, and holds her at arm’s length. His eyes are bloodshot and his beard unkempt. His voice hitches when he talks, “That’s enough! You don’t get to have a breakdown.”

 

 

 

“Ron, it’s Ann.” Leslie pleads, “Ann.”

 

 

 

“What do we need to do?” Again, Ben with his calm voice. Leslie closes her eyes and in the back of her head she thinks she ought to be grateful for his steadiness, but now she just wants to scream. Her fingers itch and she is trembling.  _Ann._

 

 

 

Ron pulls out a piece of paper. His hands tremble as he reads the list, “We need a 10 day supply of tetanus immunoglobulin, metronidazole, and diazepam. We’ll need IV equipment too,” he looks up at them.

 

 

 

“And that’ll make it better?” Leslie looks between Ron and Ben.

 

 

 

Ron shakes his head, “We don’t know. This is to treat a mild case. It should work, but if the infection is bad then…”

 

 

 

“Then what?”

 

 

 

“Then it won’t matter,” Ron says, “The infection causes muscle spasms and can inhibit airflow. It can damage her heart or brain. Ann says she’d need to be in an ICU to have a chance. She’s need to be on a ventilator and even then it would be a long shot.”

 

 

 

“Then we need to go get her and bring her to Pawnee,” Leslie starts toward the truck. But April moves quick. She places herself between Leslie and the truck.

 

 

 

“She won’t go,” Ron’s voice breaks as he says it, “I loaded her up yesterday, but she climbed right out. Spasmed in the front yard of the cabin. She insists everything that we can do can be done at the cabin. Says it isn’t safe to move her.”

 

 

 

“This is insane,” Leslie takes a step toward the truck, but April spreads her arms, “April, do not get in my way.”

 

 

 

“You don’t get to spiral, Leslie.” April says.

 

 

 

“April, move.”

 

 

 

The girl raises her chin, “This isn’t the Parks department. You’re not my boss. We do this together.”

 

 

 

“It is Ann!”

 

 

 

“And Ann is the medical professional. If she says she can be treated at the cabin then we should listen to her,” April argues.

 

 

 

Leslie turns around and looks from Ron to Ben to Andy and back to April, “When did the world go mad?” she shouts, “It is Ann.”

 

 

 

“Leslie,” Ben approaches, “Pawnee barely has a hospital anymore. It is overrun with refugees. And Dr. Harris isn’t even there. Remember? He’s in Snerling with some of the nurses. You sent him there on a humanitarian mission. He won’t be back for weeks. That is time we don’t have. Ann is her own best bet right now. And we have to listen to what she says.”

 

 

 

Leslie swallows. That hole in the earth threatens to grow, to swallow her entirely. “Give me Grace,” she holds out her arms.

 

 

 

Ben steps back, “No. Not when you’re like this.”

 

 

 

“Give me my baby!”

 

 

 

“We’re not doing this Leslie,” he levies his voice so it is as low, just for them, even though everyone can hear, “She isn’t a shield. She’s a baby. And you’re going to scare her if you wake her up like this.”

 

 

 

“We don’t have time for this!” Ron roars, “I’ve already been to the hospital. They don’t have the diazepam. That’s what stops her muscle spams. Without it she could stop breathing or cause a heart attack or brain damage.”

 

 

 

It is everyone else’s turn to stare wide eyed at Ron. But the clouds threatening to obscure Leslie’s reason split and she begins to think clearly again.

 

 

 

“I know someone,” she looks at them, “Someone whose job it is to find things.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

To be honest, April doesn’t really like Ann.

 

 

 

She used to date Andy and she is lame. But that doesn’t mean April wants her to die. Cause she’s important to Leslie. Cause she is kind even if she is lame. Cause Andy will always care about her. Cause April doesn’t have much family left. She doesn’t get to be picky. That’s part of growing-up, April thinks, realizing people can be uncool and important at the same time.

 

 

 

She breezes into the Snakehole with the cool metal of the gun pressing through her t-shirt and against her ribs. Tugs on the collar of her jacket and scans for the man Leslie described. Tall. White hair. Blue eyes. It could be half-a-dozen men in the Snakehole except for the last word Leslie used to describe him:  debonair.

 

 

 

It is a strange word, but when April spots Brad Zale she gets it. She only catches his profile, but compared to the rest of the Snakehole crowd, he holds himself differently. Taller. Straighter. For an old dude he’s not so bad. Not like attractive or anything, but handsome in a wrinkled way.

 

 

 

She ignores Sewage Joe behind the bar and crosses to the back booth where Zale is keeping company with a couple grizzled old men. Cigarette smoke hangs above them in plumes and no one really talks. Their knuckles are cracked and oil stains their nails. They must work on one of the farms that rim Pawnee.

 

 

 

The farms are a netherworld of drifters and people rendered homeless by the bombs. They joined up with one of the farms and in exchange for hard labor were welcomed into a makeshift family. That family may or may not turn on you when they don’t have enough food or if you stepped out of line, but for a lot of men and women it was their best option. If she didn’t have Andy and the Parks department, April would probably be on one of this farms.

 

 

 

The men lean back, the smoke drifts, and she gets her first direct glimpse at Brad Zale.

 

 

 

Her stomach drops. It is  _him_. The man she found holding Grace the morning of Grist’s attack. The man who set her on edge. She approaches the booth and he takes a drag of a cigarette. His eye flick up and there is recognition there.

 

 

 

He remembers her.

 

 

 

“Leslie Knope needs your help,” April tucks her hands into her pockets. She can feel the gun in its holster under her jacket. There is no doubt in her mind she could take out the other men before they could stand up, but Zale holds himself tight and straight. It reminds her of Ben, except Zale isn’t scrawny like Ben. There is a quickness in the set of his shoulders.

 

 

 

The men jeer, but with a flick of his chin they scoot out of the booth and let him out. April looks at his hands. There are no oil stains or cracked knuckles. He may hang out with men from the farms, but he isn’t one of them.

 

 

 

She follows him outside the bar. Leslie and Ben wait in the truck down the street. Ben thought it best he stay away from the Snakehole unless they wanted more trouble and without explanation, Leslie said the same applied to her. Andy and Ron have Grace and what medical supplies Ron was able to steal from the hospital. It is telling that Leslie hasn’t said a word about the fact that he raided their supplies. She is mayor. But it is Ann. The rules are different when it comes to Leslie’s family.

 

 

 

“We diazepam,” April tries to act nonchalant, “and the hospital is out.”

 

 

 

He surveys her, “That’s a pretty potent drug.”

 

 

 

“It’s not for recreational use,” she glances down the street toward where the truck sits with its lights off. This doesn’t feel right to her. Why did Leslie trust this guy?

 

 

 

Zale scratches the back of his neck, “Where is Leslie? Why didn’t she come herself?”

 

 

 

“She’s nearby,” April shrugs. She stuffs the panic back down into her chest. She tries to act like her normal, bored self, “Can you get it or not?”

 

 

 

He shrugs, “Probably, but I want to come with you.”

 

 

 

“What?”

 

 

 

“You’re going somewhere.”

 

 

 

“No I’m not.”

 

 

 

“Normally you wear a black leather jacket, but tonight you’ve got a parka. You’ve got heavy duty hiking boots on and you’re squirming all over the place which tells me you’re in a hurry to get somewhere and get there fast. And I don’t think it is home or anyplace nearby,” Zale looks down the length of his nose at her, “And I want to go with you.”

 

 

 

“No.”

 

 

 

“Then no diazepam.”

 

 

 

April narrows her eyes, “I don’t know who you are, but don’t think for a second I trust you. But it’s up to Leslie,” She gathers more confidence than she feels and closes the distance between Zale and herself. She has to look up to meet his gaze, but she gets uncomfortably close and says, “If you for one second even think about double crossing us I will murder you in your sleep and then I’ll get a melon baller and scoop out your eyes and eat them.”

 

 

 

Zale huffs and April rolls her eyes, “Whatever. Come on.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The lights of their truck cut through the woods. There is a full moon and Ben feels ill moving under it. They drive past the turn off to begin the climb through the hills toward the cabin. Behind them Ron keeps close in his truck which carries Andy, April, and Champion. Ben glances in the rear view mirror and sees Champion licking Ron’s face while Andy and April laugh and he smiles. He is thankful for the small reprieve in the heaviness settling into their guts.

 

 

 

Next to him Grace sleeps in her carseat and Leslie leans against the passenger door. She has retreated into that place, the place where her mother is dead, where she has lost too many of Pawnee’s citizens, and she might lose her best friend. He wishes he could reach her in that place.

 

 

 

But Ben will settle for the fact that she convinced this Brad Zale guy to give them the medicine without coming with them. April walked him to the truck and Ben kept his hand on his gun the entire time. Zale drew Leslie away from them, just a few feet, and it was the longest three minutes of Ben’s life as the two negotiated.

 

 

 

In the end, Zale settled for some other terms. Terms Leslie said she would explain later. Right now she just wanted to get to Ann.

 

 

 

They met Zale on the south side of Pawnee, in the parking lot of the closed down Sweetum’s factory. The place caught fire in the weeks after the bombs and now stood like a skeletal animal, rotting against Pawnee’s horizon. Leslie got out of the truck to meet Zale and Ben noticed April’s inhale when she did.

 

 

 

“You don’t trust this guy?”

 

 

 

She chewed on her bottom lip, “The day Grist showed up remember how I saw you following him away?”

 

 

 

“Yeah.”

 

 

 

“I went out to check because I just had this feeling, like something was wrong,” April played with her hands.

 

 

 

“You’ve got good instincts, April.”

 

 

 

She looked at him straight on, “When I got back inside Brad Zale was in Leslie’s office and he was holding Grace.”

 

 

 

Ben went cold. He reached for the door handle. He was going to stop this. They’d get the diazepam some other way. But April stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

 

 

 

“He didn’t hurt her. Just said he was worried about a baby left alone. Put her down and left,” April said, “But it scared me. And I thought I was crazy to be so scared of this guy when he didn’t do anything, but everything about him makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.”

 

 

 

“And somehow he just happens to know Leslie?” Ben rubbed his jaw, “Shit. Shit. Shit. Why can’t anything fucking go right? Why can’t we get a break?”

 

 

 

“Do you think he’s working for Grist?”

 

 

 

“He’s Grist’s partner. Gotta be,” Ben leaned both hands on the steering wheel and watched Zale hand Leslie the diazepam, “Only someone like that would stock up on meds. And the day Grist showed up all he wanted was to know Grace was alright. I bet he was the distraction so Zale could slip in and check on her.”

 

 

 

Leslie was walking back to the truck now and she had a funny look on her face, like everything was moving in slow motion around her. Ben’s heart wrenched.

 

 

 

“Aren’t you going to stop him?” April started for the door, to stop the retreating Zale, but Ben stopped her.

 

 

 

“We’ve got to get the medicine to Ann. Ann is more important,” he watched Leslie’s face as he said it, “Besides we’ve got what they want. We’ve got Grace. Let’s help Ann and then you and I’ll go after Zale.”

 

 

 

And that is the plan. Ben turns into an abandoned driveway and kills the lights. Ron hurdles past. If anyone is following the hope is they’ll keep with Ron. Ben and Leslie will leave the truck in the abandoned barn behind the house. Ben will take the medicine and equipment and Leslie is already strapping the carrier to her chest. They will back track in the dark to the turn off they passed and hike the last five miles through the woods to the cabin. Ben goes through the booby traps Ron told him about along the way. Eventually Ron will hide his truck in the woods and he, Andy, and April will hike into the cabin from the other direction. They would get there as dawn broke. It might be overkill, but Ben isn’t willing to take any chances.

 

 

 

He and Leslie wait in the silence of the truck. The engine whines as it stills and Grace sleeps soundlessly. They gave her the tiniest bit of sleeping medicine in a eye dropper. They didn’t want to take any chances of her cries giving them away.

 

 

 

“Ready?” He looks at Leslie. She is lifting Grace into the carrier. He reaches and helps her navigate arms and legs through holes. He allows himself one sentimental swipe of his thumb along Grace’s cheek. Leslie watches it and catches his hand in her own.

 

 

 

“Once we get there and Ann is…,” her voice catches.

 

 

 

Ben can’t help himself. He leans across and presses his lips to hers. His fingers wind through her hair and rest there. He tries to say it this way:  how sorry he is, how he hopes that it will be okay, how he will do everything to make it turn out right. It is awkward with the carseat, but they climb toward each other. She hangs on his shoulders and opens her mouth beneath his. They kiss and Ben feels something tilting in his gut, as if the gravity shifted, and the world is a little more right because he is kissing Leslie Knope.

 

 

 

She whimpers when he pulls away and idly he strokes a thumb over her cheek.

 

 

 

“When we get there and start the treatment we need to talk,” he says and she nods.

 

 

 

The snow crunches under their boots and Ben hoists the hiking pack onto his pack. His gun is tucked safely into its holster and he presses his elbow against it. He feels safer with it nearby. Leslie falls into step behind him and silently they pick their way through a field, then underbrush, and finally into the dense woods. The silvery moonlight streams high above them and Ben curses that tonight of all nights they had to slip among the trees.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Ron feels like a shadow in April and Andy’s company. They approach the cabin as the sun peaks above the horizon. They race ahead of him with Champion, excited to be reunited with their friends and anxious to find out about Ann.

 

 

 

He hangs back when they reach the clearing. The cabin sits across the field, smoke puffing from the chimney, and movement in the front windows. Even though it is dawn everyone is up. Ron doesn’t know if this is a good thing or bad.

 

 

 

He feels like a shadow in April and Andy’s company because he is. He is singular and around them he feels it acutely. When they started through the woods, April took Andy’s hand and guided him through. Explained how to place his feet to diminish their noise. Ben must have taught her how to do that, Ron thinks, and for some reason he is jealous. April was his…well, not daughter, but something like that. They always had a connection. And in the months she was in Pawnee she grew up. She fell in love, learned to take care of herself, and to protect those around her.

 

 

 

While Ron hid in the woods.

 

 

 

And now he hangs back as Andy and April press for the cabin because he is steadying himself for whatever truth waits for him. See, he has hidden in the woods, but he hasn’t been alone here.

 

 

 

Ann. Ann made all the difference. She fashioned a home out of this place and made their months here matter. She got Jerry to laugh again. She told Tom it was alright to mourn when Ron delivered the news about Jean-Ralphio. She let Donna give her a makeover. And she would not let Ron remain singular. She insisted their lives spill over into each other. She didn’t pay attention to his griping about privacy and boundaries. Said you don’t get that when you have a family.

 

 

 

If the truth is she is slipping away from him, Ron doesn’t know what he’ll do.

 

 

 

He can’t remain singular anymore.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

For three days Leslie presses her ear to the mattress and waits for Ann to come back to them. When they got to her she was floating in and out of consciousness. The fever stole her strength and even once they get the medicine into her, follow the directions she’d dictated to Donna, even then there is nothing to do, but wait.

 

 

 

Ron sits vigil on the other side of the bed. He is stoic in the hardback wooden chair. His arms rest on his knees and he doesn’t move. Leslie doesn’t say anything. They keep company in their silence. Ben comes and goes. Brings food. Tucks Grace into her arms for comfort. Insists she sleep even if it is on the floor next to Ann’s bed.  
  
  
  
  
  
Once he insists she use the shower and in the privacy of the running water she lets herself cry. She curls up on the floor of the tub and begs whatever god might still exist to spare her best friend. Remembers the last time she was in this place she mourned her mother and curses the world. Ben finds her there after the water turns cold. He tucks terry cloth towels around her and holds her on the floor of the bathroom until she is ready to face it again.

 

 

 

It all hurt. Every movement, every change of the IV bags, every look at Ron’s frozen features as Ann’s breathing becomes more and more labored. But nothing hurts as much watching Ann spasm. It begins in her face and moves down her throat. She chokes and coughs and Leslie helps her sit up. Ron sits behind her, tucks her against his chest, and pins her arms down so she doesn’t rip the IV needle out. Sometimes they are small like that, tremors really, and afterwards Ron and Leslie can return to their posts without reprieve.

 

 

 

But sometimes they are bad. Her eyes roll back in her head and she gasps for air. Drool slides down her chin and Ron bears down. Holds her so tight he shakes with her. Her back arches, contorts in a perfect arch, and bends her body up off the bed in a way Leslie can’t bear to watch. But she does watch because this is what it means not to give up on one another. She remembers her own speech to Pawnee when they elected her mayor. In the wake of the world they could not afford to give up on one another.

 

 

 

She catches Ann’s legs as the spasms bring her falling back down onto the mattress. She tries to protect her friend’s body from herself, soothe her between attacks, and assure Ron that soon the medicine will start to work. Soon.

 

 

 

But on the third day Leslie can’t take it anymore. She begins to get angry at Ann. Ann can’t give up on her. Leslie silently pleads, with her ear pressed to the mattress next to Ann’s neck, for Ann not to give up on her.

 

 

 

_Fight. Fight Ann. Please._

 

 

 

And when she has no more energy to plead, argue, or stand still she escapes to the living room. Donna slips behind her to take Leslie’s place and Ben hands Grace to April. He tugs her by both hands into the the bedroom he and Grace are sleeping in. The one she shared with him all those months ago before she was in love with him.

 

 

 

She is in love with him now. She knows it. But she can’t think about that right now.

 

 

 

When the door locks with a  _click_  Leslie remembers she and Ben are supposed to talk. The other thing steps forward in her mind. The other revelation from that night and for the first time in three days she thinks about it. Wonders how it could be true.

 

 

 

Ben cups her face and reads her expression perfectly. He sees the weariness and desperation in her face and he backs her against the dresser. She slips on top of it and locks her legs around his waist. He is already pulling his shirt over his head and she is unbuttoning her flannel. They don’t talk as they undress each other, pull one another closer, and touch until their bodies are slick from sweat. They don’t talk when Ben lays her out on the bed and slips inside of her. She arches her neck as he builds something deep, deeper than anyone else has ever been.

 

 

 

Her back arches when his hands lock on her hips and she recalls the second time they were together, that night in her shower before the bombs went off. She’d asked him then to chase it away too. She had him fill her because she had been so empty. He spills into her and she lets her mind chase that fact. That here was her type even as everything was ragged and hurt so goddamned much. He fits her perfectly.

 

 

 

Neither of them move afterward. Ben rolls so they lie side by side under the wool blankets. Idly she runs fingers down his forearm and back up again.

 

 

 

“I think Zale is Grist’s partner,” he says and Leslie listens as he tells her what April told him and his own conclusions. She listens but it doesn’t make much difference. Of course Zale is working with Grist. It made sense, but it didn’t matter.

 

 

 

It had been foolish to walk into the Snakehole. To go looking for something as indulgent as beer. To believe she got to live in a world where she worried about surprising her boyfriend with his favorite comfort item. Foolish to believe in that.

 

 

 

“Leslie, did you hear me?” Ben pulls away and looks at her, brow furrowed, “you’re a million miles away.”

 

 

 

“I heard you.”

 

 

 

“So you agree April and I should go after Zale once Ann gets better? Cause she’ll better Leslie. I promise. And that you stay here with Grace? She needs at least one parent.”

 

 

 

“Oh,” she says absently, “No, I think I should go with you. Let April take Grace. It’s better I come.”

 

 

 

“Leslie -,” Ben hesitates and a voice in Leslie’s head reminds her that she needs to clue him in. She can’t carry this by herself forever.

 

 

 

“I need to go,” Leslie’s fingers still on his forearm and hold on there, “I need to go because he’s my father. Brad Zale is my father.”  


***

“Explain this again,” Ron leans his hands on his knees. The rest of the Parks department - minus Ann - blinks at Leslie.

Ben squeezes her hand and Leslie looks at the spaces between her friends, at the fire burning and the lamp and the afghan over the couch. She recognizes it from Ann’s house and forces herself to exhale. How she wished Ann was here right now.

 

 

 

“Explain,” Ron says, “how this man Zale is your father?”

 

 

 

“Like Leslie said -,” Ben starts.

 

 

 

“I want to hear it from Leslie.”

 

 

 

“He showed up the day Grist came back,” Leslie says, “and went straight for Grace. Before that no one has any memory of him.”

 

 

 

“And the part about Barbara…” Ben prompts.

 

 

 

“When we met him to get the diazapam and I was alone with Zale he asked if I knew how I got my middle name. Said he always liked it cause his mother’s name was Barbara.”

 

 

 

“But he didn’t come out and just say he was your father.” Ron counters.

 

 

 

“The note left with Grace had my full name on it.”

 

 

 

“Barbara isn’t, like, rare for old people,” April tucks her knees close to her and leans against Andy’s chest.

 

 

 

“But I didn’t tell him my middle name. Ever,” Leslie shakes her head, “There is no way for him to know my middle name. It’s not like you can search the internet anymore.”

 

 

 

“What about public records?” Donna offers.

 

 

 

Ben shakes his head, “Records is on the 4th floor and it’s been shut down. A lot of things were destroyed by the sprinkler system which malfunctioned. Zale would have had to sneak up to the 4th floor, waded through thousands of mildewed file folders, and found the right one. Why? Why is he so interested in Leslie and Grace unless he’s connected to Grist?”

 

 

 

“That doesn’t make him your father,” April says. Leslie has the stray thought she sounds like Ann, the voice of reason.

 

 

 

Leslie exhales, “In exchange for the diazapam, he asked for the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip.”

 

 

 

That impresses no one so she explain, “It’s an original. The artist, Watterson, was a recluse and only gave a few pieces away. Never licensed the stuff so you can’t go out and buy reproductions. My father had an original and it was his prize possession. After my mom died I found it in her room. I have it and no one would have ever known about something like that unless he was my father.”

 

 

 

“There isn’t anyway he heard you bragging about it or knew your mom had it?” Ron asks.

 

 

 

Leslie shakes her head, “What good is a rare comic strip in this world? I never mentioned it to anyone, even Ben.”

 

 

 

She thinks about those six months they circled around each other, the time they wasted not trusting one another, but pushes that aside. She can feel Ben’s hand on her arm and blinks hard at the reminder that he is her family now. He and Grace and everyone here.

 

 

 

This thing with Zale didn’t change who her family is. He may be her father, but she did not know that man. Her father had been a candy salesman. He sent her post cards when he traveled and taught her how to swing. That was her daddy.

 

 

 

“He wanted me to know,” she says more to herself than anyone else, “that’s why he wanted to trade the comic strip for the diazpam. But I was so focused on Ann that I didn’t get it. I thought his request was weird, but I never connected it to him being my father. So then when we made the trade he said the thing about my middle name. There was this moment where I just looked at him and I knew. And he knew I knew and the words were right there. The truth was right there.”

 

 

 

She swallows and instead of looking at the spaces among her friends she looks each one in the eye. There are furrowed brows and frowns and pale cheeks. And somehow that made all this a little bit more bearable. They were right there with her.

 

 

 

“But there was Ann,” she continues, “I chose Ann. I turned around and walked back to the truck because we needed to get to Ann.”

 

 

 

“And it worked,” Ben presses a kiss to her cheek. Donna and Jerry nod. Andy smiles.

 

 

 

The medicine was working. The spasms had slowed and grown smaller. Her fever had broken and for the first time in a week she was actually resting, sleeping peacefully. They would never know if there had been time to spare, if Leslie could have reached out and touched her father’s arm, asked the questions at the tip of her tongue. The choice had been clear as soon as she realized it. Ann. Always Ann. And Grace and Ben and Ron and April and Andy and Tom and Jerry and Donna.

 

 

 

Her family.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Later Leslie listens to the peaceful breathing of Ben and Grace. It is the first night she has crawled into bed with Ben. Ron insisted on taking the post at Ann’s bedside. Leslie would relieve him in the morning. But even in Ben’s arms she can’t sleep.

 

 

 

She slips from bed. In his sleep, Ben rolls after her and she stops and presses a kiss to his lips, “Sleep, love,” she whispers and hopes her voice fades into his dreams.

 

 

 

The only light in the living room is the low glow of embers in the fireplace. Leslie picks the afghan up off the back of the couch and wraps it around her shoulders.

 

 

 

“Can’t sleep either?”

 

 

 

Donna’s voice startles her. Sitting at the round table in the corner are her and Jerry. They each hug a mug of coffee.

 

 

 

“Neither of us sleep much,” Jerry explains as Leslie sinks down into a chair. Donna is up and getting her a cup for coffee and Leslie knows she should turn it down. That much caffeine will keep her up and she should be sleeping.

 

 

 

“Tom’s usually up with us too, but sometimes he gets lucky,” Donna pushes the coffee toward Leslie and she takes a sip. Closes her eyes with the taste. There is something comforting about coffee. Something deep and familiar.

 

 

 

“This stuff with your dad keeping you up?” Jerry says.

 

 

 

She shakes her head, “I don’t think so. I mean it doesn’t change anything does it?”

 

 

 

“If my father rose from the grave I’d be freak-ing out,” Donna says.

 

 

 

“If he was the father I remembered,” Leslie argues, “then he would have found me the moment he got to Pawnee. He wouldn’t have hidden himself. He would explain who Grace is. He…he…he wouldn’t be involved with a man like Grist.”

 

 

 

And that is the awful truth keeping her up.

 

 

 

It isn’t that her father was alive. That fact is so numbing that she can’t really process it yet. To process that her father is alive is like trying to imagine the scarred landscape of all those cities blown up. Trying to imagine all of those places and people wiped off the map is like trying to wrap her mind around her father’s existence.

 

 

 

No, it isn’t that he is alive. What keeps her up is that in living he chose to align himself with someone like Grist. The man who shot Jean-Ralphio. Who stuck a knife in Ben’s stomach and ripped it left. Tore his flesh and practically tore Leslie in two.   _That_ was the man her father was taking orders from?

 

 

 

The truth is she doesn’t know that man. Brad Zale is a stranger. Richard Knope had been her father and he died when she was a child. She stood on the beach in Florida and spread his ashes, hugged her mother’s waist, as they recited parts of T.S. Eliot’s  _The Waste Land_ because it was his favorite poem.

 

 

 

Years later, she can still recite passages of it because as a child he bribed her to learn them. When she memorized whole pages his blue eyes shone and they would say them together, their voices layering, until the end when they exhaled the same long breath. The satisfaction of achievement. As an adult, Leslie comforted herself by reading passages aloud. She recited them before big moments, reminding herself she conquered something before and she could do it again.

 

 

 

The man who taught her poetry had nothing to do with Brad Zale.

 

 

 

And what is worse, the place where there is the most pain, is that she can’t talk to Marlene. Did her mother know? Was she fooled or did she participate in lying to Leslie her whole life? Had there been a moment in her dying where she tried to tell Leslie? How much duplicity defined her life?

 

 

 

Leslie swallows the questions and buries her face in her arms. Donna touches her shoulder and rubs big arching circles.

 

 

 

“Girl, this isn’t happening to you alone,” she murmurers.

 

 

 

“I wonder every moment if my girls are alive,” Jerry says, “I convince myself there is no way they could be because if they were they would have come back by now. Surely, they would have looked for me and Gail,” Leslie lifts her head. His eyes glisten in the low firelight, “And then I think maybe they could be alive and I just don’t know the whole story. You don’t know the whole story, Leslie.”

 

 

 

It doesn’t help, but it comes from a good place. It is such a Jerry thing, to be of little help and even make things worse, but it all came from a good place.

 

 

 

She touches the back of her neck and turns in her seat. The afghan slips from her shoulders and she tugs it back. And the Christmas tree catches her eye. The aren’t any lights, but its outline in the dark gives Leslie an idea. It’s not going to solve anything, but it might help all of them sleep. It might soothe fears and offer a reprieve.

 

 

 

“You’re right Jerry,” Leslie says absently, “I can’t worry about it cause I don’t know and I may never know. In the meantime,” she smiles at her friends, “we’re going to have one hell of a Christmas.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

They already have a tree, decorated with fishing lures and whittled ornaments. Ron takes Andy and April to collect hundreds of holly berries and Leslie strings them together into a garland which she drapes around the tree in festive loops. They bring back mistletoe too and she wraps it with twine and strings it above the entrance to the kitchen.

 

 

 

Twice Andy catches her off guard with what he calls “body slam kisses.” Donna kisses everyone, even Champion. Leslie makes a point of meeting Ben there at least twice a day, squeezing his butt each time and leaving him flustered. They have a bet going on to see if who can get Ron to pucker up. April is determined, but he is diligent about never getting caught beneath it.

 

 

 

Andy doesn’t have his guitar, but Ron produces a saxophone no one knew he could play. In the evenings, he plays slow, soulful Christmas songs which fill up the corners of the cabin and lures everyone to the living room.

 

 

 

It becomes an evening ritual for them. They build up the fire and Ron helps Ann out of her room to rest on the couch. Andy plays with Grace on the floor and Ben sometimes reads aloud until someone tells him they’ve all stopped listening to whatever various biography he’s picked out of Ron’s survival library. Ann knits and Donna perfects her nail art. Leslie teaches herself cross stitch with the old kit she finds in the attic. She wants to stitch a family portrait for Grace to commemorate her first Christmas, but can’t quite get the shape of Ron’s mustache right.

 

 

 

The week before Christmas Ron makes a toboggan and they all take Grace (and Andy and Champion) sledding. Even though it is Leslie’s idea she chooses to stay home and make hot chocolate for everyone. It leaves the cabin empty save her and Ann, who naps on the couch.

 

 

 

Once everyone leaves, Leslie doesn’t wake Ann right away. Instead she sets to one of her surprises, homemade marshmallows, which turn out thick and puffy and better than anything store bought. After she licks her fingers clean, she fills two mugs with marshmallows and pours hot chocolate, unfortunately made from a mix, over them. Leslie sets the cups down and touches her friend’s shoulder. Ann groans and swats her hands away and Leslie smiles.

 

 

 

“Where is Ron?” Ann asks between sips.

 

 

 

“They all went sledding,” Leslie sits cross legged at the end of the couch and pulls Ann’s quilt over her lap.

 

 

 

“Oh,” Ann frowns and looks toward a window, “I’m just so used to him being right there when I wake up. It threw me.”

 

 

 

They fall into a silence. It is the first time they’ve talked alone since Leslie came back and what needs to be said is lodged in Leslie’s throat. She clears her throat, “Um, how do you like the marshmallows?

 

 

 

“These are the best I’ve ever had.”

 

 

 

“That’s cause I made them,” Leslie grins.

 

 

 

Ann rolls her eyes, “Of course you did. How’d you learn to make them?”

 

 

 

“My mom taught me,” the story spills out of Leslie until the end where it simply leaks out one quiet word at at time, “We used to build these elaborate gingerbread houses, me, her, and my dad, and everything had to be homemade right down to the marshmallows we uses to hold the walls up.”

 

 

 

“Leslie.”

 

 

 

“Yeah?”

 

 

 

“Do you wanna talk about your dad?”

 

 

 

Leslie rugs the quilt between two fingers, “That’s what Ben keeps asking.”

 

 

 

“So the answer is no?”

 

 

 

Leslie shrugs, “I don’t know what else there is to say. He’s my father. He works with Grist which means he’s responsible for Grace ending up with me. So he knows who she really is and has not once tried to explain. He and Grist have brainwashed Chris or something. And they aren’t above putting a loaded gun against someone’s head if that will help their agenda.”

 

 

 

“Do you feel safe here at the cabin?”

 

 

 

“Ben says Zale has shown a keen interest in knowing Grace is safe and well cared for, but no interest in actually taking her or being involved in her life. That makes him less dangerous to us. He may know where the cabin is, but as long as the status quo stays the same we should be fine. That’s what Ben says.”

 

 

 

“What do you think?”

 

 

 

“Oh, me? I don’t know,” Leslie says, “I don’t know if I feel safe or not because the reality is my father is a killer. And that,” she hiccups, “that makes me so sad.”

 

 

 

Ann pats her lap and Leslie lays down across the couch so her head lands in the space. Neither of them says anything and Ann rubs Leslie’s head just like Marlene used too.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Later that evening Ben makes Leslie come with him on his nightly walk to check the intruder alarms. They trudge through the snow and only on the final loop, when the cabin is in view, a bright smudge against the grey and shadowed woods, does Ben tug the mitten off her hand. He laces their fingers and tucks their hands into the pocket of his coat.

 

 

 

“How did your talk with Ann go?”

 

 

 

“It didn’t,” Leslie sighs and leans against his arm. They stop on the edge of the clearing and watch the smoke curl out of the cabin, “She asked about my dad and we sorta talked about that and she is the best friend in the world.”

 

 

 

“But you didn’t say you’re sorry?”

 

 

 

“Nope.”

 

 

 

“Why not?”

 

 

 

Leslie tucks her chin and Ben waits for her, “Cause I’m not entirely sorry.”

 

 

 

To his credit he says nothing and Leslie wipes her nose with the back of her one mittened hand. Inside his coat pocket, his thumb brushes her palm.

 

 

 

“It would be really nice to hide here forever, but it would be foolish.”

 

 

 

There she’s said it.

 

 

 

That was the truth. She wanted to crawl inside the concave of this place, the field and sunset through the trees and the way the cabin smelled like firewood and cinnamon. She wanted so badly to hide from the ugly truth of her life, from the responsibilities she’d abandoned in Pawnee, and the anger that threatened to shake her sometimes. She wanted to hide the way Ann had and she resented Ann for choosing it as much as she hated herself for wanting it.

 

 

 

“I mean, I never meant what I said about her being a coward. Never. She is brave and beautiful and the best person I know,” Leslie gulps.

 

 

 

“But you think it is cowardly, staying here.”

 

 

 

“For me it is.”

 

 

 

“Why?”

 

 

 

“Because I’m Pawnee’s mayor and my father is working with Grist and we have to keep Grace safe and…”

 

 

 

“Hey, hey, hey,” Ben blocks her view and threads both hands through her hair. Knocks her knit cap askew, “first you need to slow down. You don’t have to do everything and you aren’t doing it alone. You and me. Remember?”

 

 

 

She nods and exhales, the feelings she has trapped inside until her admission soothing out. Ben adjusts his grip so that her eyes tip up to meet his. They are dark pools in the night and Leslie feels that tug on her heart she doesn’t want to think about. It is the heartstrings, the sinews of her insides and what she imagines to be the deepest part of her, and it is only him that can pull on that part of her.

 

 

 

“We can’t stay here forever,” Ben agrees, “but here is where we’re at. Here is a respite. One Ann built for  _you_  and Grace and everyone else. And that is brave Leslie. It takes bravery to hold onto the good things, the good food and laughter and warmth of family, when everything else goes to shit. Building a home is a brave choice every time.”

 

 

 

And she knows he is right. The old Leslie would have made a similar speech, but somewhere hidden in the bathroom of her house in Pawnee is a notebook full of everything  she’s done that the old Leslie would have never done, every compromise made in the name of survival. Where was the line? She had never killed someone, but if it were to save Grace would she do it?

 

 

 

Yes. Without hesitation.

 

 

 

Her resentment toward Ann. The way Ben tugged on her heartstrings. Her desire to protect Grace no matter what, all of it, scared her because she didn’t know how to reconcile her past self with the girl who survived and she felt foolish hoping she one day could.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“Hey Leslie!” Andy finds Leslie collecting wood the next morning from the shed where Ron neatly stacked it before winter. He isn’t wearing a coat and his breath comes out in big plumes.

 

 

 

“Andy, you’re going to freeze.”

 

 

 

“Leslie, I need you to marry me.”

 

 

 

“Wha…”

 

 

 

“Me and April. I want to marry April and you’re the closest thing to a judge. Will you do it?”

 

 

 

Leslie has a thousand objections. It is too soon. April is too young. They should do it in Pawnee surrounded by lots of people. But Andy is an embarrassment of earnestness. Snowflakes pelt his t-shirt and he leans on the outside of his feet, his tennis shoes sinking into the snow. His eyebrows tilt up and his mouth has already broken into a smile even though she hasn’t given an answer.

 

 

 

“When do you want to do this?” Leslie buys time.

 

 

 

“Christmas Eve. I’m going to ask April and then you’ll be there and it’ll be perfect.”

 

 

 

“Wait you haven’t asked her?”

 

 

 

“No. I want it to be a surprise.”

 

 

 

“But Andy you have to give her time. To plan a wedding and get used to the idea.”

 

 

 

“Used to what? I am April’s soulmate and she is mine. What else is there to think about?”

 

 

 

Leslie’s objections seem pale in comparison to this arguement and she acquiesces, “I’d be honored to do it, but Andy,” she levels a gaze at him, “you ask April before Christmas Eve. She deserves a little time to prepare.”

 

 

 

“Yes, sir!” Andy salutes her, whoops, and bounds back for the cabin. Leslie takes a few minutes to sit on the woodpile with the sun rising, splitting pink morning light through the trees, and wonder if she would ever be as free as Andy and April.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Leslie organizes a Winter Olympics. Ben wins the snow ball throwing contest and April crafts a weird snow man whose head is on the bottom of his body. She calls is post-modernism. Tom wins a strange contest he makes up called Softest Hands and Ron wins the ice fishing contest because everyone else wimps out. They make medals out of paper and Leslie makes tiny flags to represent everyone’s nation of choice (She is Denmark; Ben, Peru; April, the moon; and Andy, Germany). And afterwards everyone sloughs off wet boots and dries lazily in front of the fire.

 

 

 

On the couch, Ben seems restless and his hand at Leslie’s waist wanders beneath the band of her jeans. Grace is worn out and quickly asleep in her play pen. When Ben squeezes her ass cheek Leslie jumps, but no one else notices. He says nothing, gets up, and goes to the bedroom. Leslie rubs her hands and shifts back and forth. Would it be too noticeable if she followed him?

 

 

 

She is still debating it when Donna, through closed eyes, says, “Girl, what the hell are you still doing here?”

 

 

 

In the bedroom, Ben is toweling off. He has shed his parka and removed his boots. Leslie flips the lock on the door and wishes they had a cd player or something. It is more than a little weird to be doing this with everyone in the living room. Luckily, the walls were thick. April and Andy’s escapades had tested them thoroughly.

 

 

 

“How’d you get so wet?” She mutters as she stands right in front of him. He is just an arm’s length away. He’s stilled and when she says that he drops the towel on the floor.

 

 

 

“Isn’t that supposed to be my question?” he smirks and Leslie snorts. But her fingers itch across his chest and find the small buttons on his flannel. She gets it halfway open before her hands wander across the plane of his stomach, the curve of his ribs, and still where his heart beats.

 

 

 

“Remember that promise we made not to fall in love all the way?” Leslie tips onto her toes and brushes her mouth against his.

 

 

 

To his credit, Ben doesn’t move. He stands so still the moment is dragged out in perfect torture. And then just as the balls of her feet begin to ache his arms loop around her and he pulls her bodily against him.

 

 

 

“I think it was no talk of soul mates or death till us part,” he is undressing her now and she helps him along, but then her bare skin touches his wet clothing and she is undressing him too because all she wants is flesh against flesh.

 

 

 

“I still don’t want to talk about it,” she says against his shoulder and then they are climbing into the bed and Ben is over her. Leslie wraps herself around him, but Ben doesn’t enter her.

 

 

 

He leans back on his heels and pulls the her ankle up to his lips. It is like that night all over again, the one that began to unravel her vow not to fall too much in love with Ben Wyatt. It was his attention to detail then and now it is his read of the subtext. Between the words she is saying something - something she doesn’t want to talk about - and because he is Ben he doesn’t need to talk about it either. And Leslie gets the message with each flutter of lips. He is saying, _me too._

 

 

 

His lips move beyond her ankle, up her shin, along the back of her leg, and still on her hip bone. He touches her until Leslie is pooled in the sheets. And because he’s not the only one who can do detail Leslie waits until he thinks he has her primed and he rises up over her, ready to enter her now, that she rolls until she is on top of him.

 

 

 

“Remember that thing you wanted to do that you said I should be a little drunk for?” Her grin is more than a little wicked, “Well, someone’s about to get lucky.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Four days before Christmas Leslie and Ann -with minor help from Donna and no help from April - bake. They make pies and breads and cookies. Andy and April lick the spoons and Ron and Ben do the dishes.

 

 

 

That night everyone helps make sugar cookies and April convinces Ron to whittle some less than PG cookie cutters. She and Andy use them to teach Grace about the birds and the bees. Leslie doesn’t mind because it is complete with conversations about birth control and women’s empowerment. And everyone laughs along with Andy’s solo reenactment of famous love scenes. And the whole thing is oddly familial until April demonstrates something a little too lewd to do to a penis sugar cookie and Ben calls the whole thing off. Gathers up Grace in his arms, blushes, and frowns like a dad while Grace giggles because everyone else is too.

 

 

 

In the six months Leslie was in Pawnee, Ann has carved out a self-sustaining life at the cabin. Ron built a simple barn for their cow, which supplied milk, and a roost of chickens which were generous with their eggs and sometimes themselves. The garden had been a wild success and Ann canned and preserved everything. Ron’s meet-ups with Ben filled out their supplies so that the cabin was well stocked for celebrating. Leslie stands back and surveys how well everything works. She admits to Ben later how impressed she is.

 

 

 

They plan a feast for Christmas Eve and draw for Secret Santas. And suddenly the cabin is filled with mischief and there are quickly slammed doors and Ron stays outside in the shed where his tools are longer than usual. Leslie relishes in the noises and finds herself, for the first time in months, readily happy. She doesn’t have to search for it. The excitement bubbles out of her and she bats away thoughts of her father and her conversation with Ben in the woods.

 

 

 

She will get back to real life after Christmas.

 

 

 

And she apologizes to Ann when they are elbow deep in pie crusts and plans for the wild turkey Ron was outside dressing.

 

 

 

“I was a jerk,” she says abruptly.

 

 

 

“For what?”

 

 

 

Leslie glances at the table where Donna and Tom and April are peeling potatoes.

 

 

 

“For our fight when I left for Pawnee.”

 

 

 

Ann wipes her brow. She is sweating from the work. Leslie frowns. She was still not full recovered from her illness and Leslie’s Christmas plans were probably pushing her too hard.

 

 

 

“I was a jerk too.”

 

 

 

“You’re not a coward. I’m just scared,” she drops her voice, “I haven’t told Ben I love him yet. At least not all the way.”

 

 

 

“Can you be part-of-the-way in love?”

 

 

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

 

 

“So you are in love with him?”

 

 

 

Leslie swallows, “Do you think there is a chance I’m not?”

 

 

 

“God, no,” Ann laughs, “you were hip deep in love with him when you left for Pawnee.”

 

 

 

When they left for Pawnee they hadn’t been a thing. She had broken it off when she found out the truth about Ben’s past. But even then they moved as a unit. Grace had tethered them together like a life line until they could find one another on their own.

 

 

 

Leslie snorts, “Maybe I was.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

They drew for Secret Santa, but Leslie is always going to make everyone a present.

 

 

 

For Donna, she sewed a silk purse for all of her manicure paraphernalia. Tom was getting a pair of custom slippers lined with rabbit fur. She had a whole tray of Deviled Eggs hiding in the back of the refrigerator for Ron. Ann was getting a cross stitched pillow littered with every adjective Leslie could think to describe her best friend. And Jerry, Jerry, was getting his own socks, which Leslie had darned where he wore out the heels.

 

 

 

Andy and April were getting, perhaps, the best present. It was a joint gift from everyone. They were getting a wedding.

 

 

 

A real wedding on Christmas Eve under the stars.

 

 

 

If Leslie could she would arrange for snow itself, but she can’t so she focuses on more achievable goals. She recruits everyone else and in three days they manage to put together an event to be proud of. Ann and Donna rip apart the only dress they can find in Ron’s attic, a red satin number that Ron refuses to answer questions about, and turn it into a lovely hot number. Donna swears if you can’t be dressed in white at your wedding, you should at least be hot. They gather candles to line a path. Ben treks through the woods to gather holly and anything still green and ties it all together in a make-shift bouquet. Ron fashions an archway from birch and Tom helps him assemble it in the middle of the field beneath a clear sky. Everyone forgets to tell Jerry until the day of and they put him in charge of Champion.

 

 

 

And Leslie digs through her pack to find her contribution. Two wedding rings on a chain. She had been wearing it beneath her sweater the night Ron showed up on her doorstep with the news about Ann. Marlene used to wear Richard Knope’s wedding band on the chain beneath her power suits and when her mother died Leslie strung her mother’s along side it. But after that night she had realized the truth about Brad Zale and stuffed the rings in her pack.

 

 

 

She wonders if it is bad luck to give them to Andy and April, but decides it was the right thing to do. Her mother had believed in those rings. She had believed in that marriage and that was powerful enough to counteract any taint they carried from her father’s betrayal.

 

 

 

And on Christmas Eve it begins to snow as the sun sets which makes Leslie feel like a real life Santa.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“I know what you’re doing,” April trudges past Ben in the woods. Under the guise of checking the alarms before they set to the festivities, Ben lures April away from the cabin. He is supposed to keep her out for an hour and then bring her in through the woods instead of across the field where the archway and candle aisle will be set up. Inside the cabin, Leslie would be waiting to help April put on her wedding dress. Ben was sure the girl would freeze her ass off in that thing, but he didn’t comment. He was happy for them and even happier to see Leslie excited. She hadn’t mentioned her father all week.

 

 

 

“What am I doing?”

 

 

 

“You’re distracting me while they set up my wedding,” she says, “the cabin is like thirty feet wide.”

 

 

 

Ben gapes, but shrugs and follows April. Fine with him if she wanted to suck all the magic out of her own day. After they check the last alarm, he starts back toward the cabin like planned but April heads for the field.

 

 

 

“No,” he grabs her elbow, “you’re going to let them do this.”

 

 

 

“It’s just a dumb wedding,” she tries to shrug him off, “I just want to say the words and kiss Andy’s stupid face and act like it is a normal night.”

 

 

 

“Right now Andy is grinning like an idiot in a field of snow and Leslie is lighting candles and Ron is getting ready to give you away.”

 

 

 

“I didn’t ask for any of this.”

 

 

 

And she is so much like Leslie that Ben loses it. He stomps a few feet, thinks about it, and spins on her,

 

 

 

“No! You are going to do this because this stuff matters. It matters to Andy and you love him right?”

 

 

 

“Dude, you’ve got this vein like popping out of your forehead and its gross. Stop,” April hugs her arms to her stomach.

 

 

 

“I’m not going to stop. I get that your family is gone and the world is scary but that doesn’t mean you get to give up all the important things.”

 

 

 

“Ben -,”

 

 

 

“Cause, cause I can tell you that the world was scary before the bombs went off and lots of people didn’t have families, but that didn’t mean you get to give up on people.”

 

 

 

“Ben -,”

 

 

 

“WHAT!”

 

 

 

“You’re projecting,” she shrugs, “Tell Leslie you’re in love with her and stop worrying if she’ll say it back cause she totally will cause she is,” she exhales, “Now let’s go to my wedding.”

 

 

 

Ben smiles as she trudges past him, “April.”

 

 

 

“What?”

 

 

 

“Congrats.”

 

 

 

“Whatever.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

April Roberta Ludgate marries Andrew William Dwyer on Christmas Eve beneath a waning moon and falling snow. They are surrounded by their family and the woods holds itself in perfect silence. April wears her siren shift and snow boots. She winds a scarf around her neck and borrows Leslie’s purple stripped hat. But she leaves her coat unzipped and there is a long peak of leg. When Ron escorts her out of the cabin, Andy shouts, “My wife is so hot!”

 

 

 

Ben carries Grace down the aisle and helps her throw mistletoe leaves along the path. They stand at Leslie’s elbow as she performs the wedding. She has a speech prepared about commitment and the long history of marriage, but when she sees their expressions, saved only for one another, she talks about love and how it strengthens us and well, she’s not exactly sure because she is crying by the end. They are all crying a little bit and when Andy finally kisses April, Ann suggests they hurry up and get inside because it is freezing out here.

 

 

 

Inside, there is the feast Leslie and Ann prepared. Ron brings out whiskey and while Leslie would have preferred champagne she starts the toasts. They all toast and there is lots of talk about feelings.

 

 

 

And after dinner there is dessert and more whiskey and Ron brings out his saxophone until Ben disappears into the bunker and produces the short wave radio. He fiddles with the dials for a long time, but finally the static clears and Bing Crosby is singing.

 

 

 

_I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones I used to know._

 

 

 

“Someone is out there broadcasting,” Leslie grins, “about Christmas. Someone else is celebrating.”

 

 

 

And Ben pulls her and Grace into an embrace and they sway in the kitchen. Andy and April start in the living room. Jerry holds out a hand to Donna. Tom is too drunk to do much besides lounge on the couch with Champion, but they croon the chorus together with Bing.

 

 

 

_May your days be merry and bright._

 

 

 

And from the corner of her eye, Leslie sees Ann pull Ron away from his saxophone. She places his hands in the small of her back and winds her arms around his neck. Their first steps are awkward, but Ann whispers something in Ron’s ear and he turns pink. She takes advantage and backs him up two steps so they are under the mistletoe. He kisses her and everyone pretends not to notice, to let the moment belong just to them.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

There are still gifts to exchange, but once Grace falls asleep everyone else starts peeling off for bed. Presents can wait till morning. Andy and April head to their honeymoon bunker where their bed has been moved and the place is stocked with enough food for three days. Ann announces Ron is going to help her get settled and no one waggles eyebrows until the door clicks shut.

 

 

 

“I thinnnnk,” Donna lolls her head toward Tom, “that when Leslie and Ben go back to Pawnee we need to go with them because it is getting damn domestic up in here.”

 

 

 

“We need to treat ourselves,” he nods, “Pawnee won’t know what hit it.”

 

 

 

“I think I am going to go too,” Jerry sighs, “to look for my girls.”

 

 

 

“Do you think your daughters might like the taste of some Tommy and his new sidekick Champion,” Tom slurs and Jerry bursts out laughing. Leslie isn’t sure if it is at the idea of Tom with one of his daughters or if he is still drunk, but she picks up Grace’s blanket and Ben’s cardigan. He is putting the baby down in their room. She waves good night and is about to turn toward the bedroom when something in the window over Donna’s shoulder ripples. But Leslie tells herself she is seeing shadows. It has to be the whiskey and all the feelings. No one else noticed anything.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

In their bedroom, Grace sleeps in the cradle Ron made for her. It swings  _whoosh, whoosh, whoosh_ in a gentle sway. Ben hasn’t undressed or climbed under the covers yet. An oil lamp burns low on the bedside table. Leslie kneels at the foot of the bed and sits on her hands.

 

 

 

“I want to give you your present tonight,” she says.

 

 

 

He grins, “I have yours too.”

 

 

 

And he pulls something out of his pocket. It fits in his fist and Leslie misses, for a second, things like wrapping paper and bows and such nonsense. But then he opens his hand and in his palm is a silver locket. It is shaped like a heart and in the lamplight she reads the name engraved on the front,  _Grace._

 

 

 

“I found it in Sewage Joe’s plunder. No one claimed it. I was carrying it when we came out here and I thought you’d want it,” he says and Leslie smiles because he is nervous, “I - I know it isn’t new, but I like to think it belonged to someone else who had a Grace and I hope that -,”

 

 

 

“I love it,” Leslie says and he exhales in relief. She kisses him and his terrible face for a long time until they are half-naked and shivering a little. They peel off the last of their clothing and Ben pulls back the quilts, but Leslie remembers his gift tucked in the back of her dresser. She scrambles, naked, across the room and returns with it held behind her back.

 

 

 

“You are going to kill me,” Ben groans, “You. Are. Absolutely. Beautiful. Gorgeous.” He reaches for her, but Leslie sits on the edge of the bed and no further.

 

 

 

“Here,” she says, “it isn’t finished or even really started except for one part, but I hope that is okay.” Now it is her turn to be nervous. Ben unfurls the paper and Leslie can’t wait for him to realize what it is, “It’s a Unity quilt. Or at least the plans for one. I’ve started the first square, but I can’t finish it cause I realized I don’t know anything about your parents or your history. But that doesn’t matter because I know you and I want to be with you. Forever. Because I love you.”

 

 

 

He looks up at her in wonderment, “I am completely, ridiculously in love with you.”

 

 

 

“I thought you might be.”

 

 

 

“When you say forever…”

 

 

 

“I mean death do us part, soul mates, never want to be parted from you,” Leslie climbs up his body and Ben pulls the blankets over her. She punctuates each word with a kiss, “I want to build a home with you and Grace. A family.”

 

 

 

“After we get Grist…”

 

 

 

She shakes her head, “I don’t want to wait. You said there are things that make all the grief worth living. I don’t want to wait for those things.”

 

 

 

They grin together and Ben rolls so they are tangled together, a column of sighs and love and wishes coming true.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Chris retreats back to his tent when the merriment in the cabin dies down. He watched through a window at the merriment and dancing. Something tight lodged in his throat when he saw Ann kiss Ron. Before the bombs he had liked Ann, but that seems like a lifetime ago.

 

 

 

He settles into his single sleeping bag and stares at the nylon top of his tent. He wishes at least he could sleep beneath the stars, but the night is too cold. Zale and Grist had sent him. They thought he might be able to get Ben to trust him, but Chris knew better. After that boy died and Grist had stabbed Ben, Chris almost left them. He had gone crazy for a few weeks, wrecked with guilt, crying for no reason. But he had been to new D.C. and had seen the people who were running this country. Despite everything, Chris believed in Zale and Grist. Believed in their plan. Gambled the only friend he had left in the world on it.

 

 

 

It had hurt to watch his former friend and their new family. To see them and return back to this lonely tent and not even have stars to keep him company.

 

 

 

And tomorrow he is going to walk into that cabin and demand Grace. Grace, the one factor that could prevent everything from getting worse. He is going to demand her and they won’t agree.

 

 

 

And then he’ll have to do the unforgivable. He’ll have to take her from them.

 

***

Ben wakes up Christmas morning thinking about his first day as an FBI agent

  
  
  
  


After field training he had been assigned to the Indianapolis field office, which was better than the worst case scenario: Omaha. The only reason he even got the post was because his analytical aptitude tests were off the charts - especially when it came to numbers. He was great with numbers. If there was a pattern Ben could analyze it. They called him the boy wonder. His physical aptitude tests had not been high. They had been no where near high. There was no way of getting around it - Ben was kind of shrimpy. He was a nerd. Survival skills and firearms training was not his cup of tea. Worse than his physical aptitude results were his interpersonal skills. Post-Icetown Ben was bitter and withdrawn. He melted down easily and there were serious concerns if he was stable enough to be an agent.

 

 

 

That is where Chris came in. Chris the Six Million Dollar Man had, for some reason, latched onto Ben. The first day of field training he pointed at him with both pointer fingers slung out like six shooters and grinned, “Hey buddy!"

 

 

 

It was Chris who woke Ben up extra early to run. It was Chris who make him protein shakes to add weight to his elf-like frame. It was Chris whose endless optimism would not let Ben quit. He practices motivational messages on Ben and oddly over time Ben begins to believe. He doesn’t buy everything Chris preaches but he does begin to believe in himself again. It was Chris who found Ben in the tedious accounting department his first day as an FBI agent. He clapped him on the shoulder and grinned, “Hey buddy!"

 

 

 

Chris had been Ben’s longest and really only friend until the bombs went off.

 

 

 

Ben thinks about Chris on Christmas morning. Inexplicably he thinks about his friend and how he wants to tell Chris about Leslie. He misses the old Chris who would have cried tears of joy at the news that Ben found his forever. He would have glimpsed this strange, improbable family and declared it a beautiful thing.

 

 

 

“Merry Christmas,” Leslie mutters against his neck.

 

 

 

Chris and the FBI fall instantly from Ben’s thoughts.

 

 

 

He rolls onto his side and hooks a hip over Leslie’s leg. The cabin is heated which means though she put on a t-shirt after their celebration last night she left her legs bare. He runs a finger idly along the back of her thigh, “Merry Christmas."

 

 

 

He kisses her forehead and her cheek before hovering over her lips, “I love you,” he says and when she says it back, whispers it, Ben can’t help it. He thinks like Chris. He thinks life is beautiful.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Grace wakes up before they can  _celebrate_  again. They play thumb war and Ben loses. She goes to take a shower and Ben scoops the baby up.

 

 

 

“Da. Da. Da,” she snuggles into the curve of his shoulder. Like Ben, Grace has never been a morning person. She wakes up slowly. He would never admit it to Leslie, but taking her of her in the morning is one of his favorite things. Leslie can grab all the first showers. He’ll always take Grace in the morning.

 

 

 

“It’s Christmas,” Ben points to the tree. The living room is quiet, but the light in the kitchen is on. The whole cabin smells like pancakes. Ann leans against the stove as batter hisses on the griddle pan.

 

 

 

“Merry Christmas,” Ann kisses Grace on the cheek and tickles her tummy.

 

 

 

“Good night?” Ben sinks into a chair at the kitchen table. Grace fists his t-shirt and sucks her thumb.

 

 

 

Ann quirks an eyebrow and sets a plate of pancakes in front of him and Grace. Ben breaks the pancake into bites and hands a piece at a time to Grace. Ann pours two mugs of coffee and sits down across from Ben. She scoots him the second mug and sips her own.

 

 

 

“Why did you join the FBI?"

 

 

 

“Excuse me?"

 

 

 

She lifts a shoulder and lets it fall, “Why did you join the FBI? I mean it takes a certain type of person to want to hunt down terrorists."

 

 

 

“I started out in forensic accounting."

 

 

 

“But you ended up in Pawnee just before nuclear bombs tore this country in two."

 

 

 

“Are you trying to ask me something, Ann?"

 

 

 

She crosses arms, “I want to know you’re the kind of guy who is going to stay. Leslie’s father was a secret agent man and he didn’t stay."

 

 

 

“You’re seriously comparing me to Zale?!"

 

 

 

“I’m just pointing out something you have in common with him,” Ann says, “I worry about Leslie. Since the bombs she’s become determined."

 

 

 

“From what little I knew of her before the bombs she was always determined."

 

 

 

Ann stares into her coffee cup, “She can’t save the world. Not this world. I think she believes that if she rebuilds Pawnee and keeps Grace safe it’ll balance out all the hurt. It’ll somehow make Marlene’s death and the death of so many other people less horrible."

 

 

 

“I don’t see why that is a bad thing."

 

 

 

Her eyes flick up to meet his, “Cause when she achieves it it still won’t be enough. It won’t make the grief and pain go away. And that I’m afraid will break her."

 

 

 

“Ann, she’s got you. She’s got Ron and Andy and April and everyone else. She’s got me and Grace. She’s got a family. We aren’t going anywhere.” Ben holds Grace tighter, “If that happens we’ll be there for her. I will be there. I promise I’m not going anywhere. I won’t leave her."

 

 

 

She smiles sadly and Ben frowns. “I hope you’re right,” she says and pushes herself up from the chair, “because I’m sure her father thought the same thing."

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Ron isn’t sure what to do with Ann. He wakes up and she is already making breakfast. Ben and Grace are out there so that means they have an audience, but when Ron walks out there Ben barely looks at him. He concentrates on feeding Grace. Ann is flipping pancakes at the stove and Ron stands in the middle of the kitchen feeling like a fool.

 

 

 

Is he supposed to kiss her? It feels like such a normal morning. One of the dozens he’s had with her in the last seven months. Except she is wearing his favorite sweatshirt. It loops off at her thighs and he remembers what she looked like last night wearing just his sweatshirt as they climbed into bed together. This isn’t a normal morning. This is the morning after.

 

 

 

She’s got sleep pants on, but Ron can’t stop seeing the image of her in just his sweatshirt with the cuffs rolled up. He clears his throat and Ann looks up. She flips a pancake, sets down the spatula, and comes to the middle of the kitchen where he is. With one hand on his chest, she reaches up on her tiptoes and kisses him lightly.

 

 

 

“Merry Christmas,” she smiles.

 

 

 

And Ron realizes something. Wondering what he is to do with Ann is an asinine thought. All he has to do is follow her lead.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The knock comes just as they all are sitting down to open presents.

 

 

 

It echoes above Andy’s shouts. Champion barks and growls deep in his chest. Ben looks across the room to Leslie who is holding Grace. She clutches the baby to her chest. Ben jerks his head toward their bedroom and she nods. She and Ann disappear with Grace. April follows close behind. She nods to Ben as she closes the door.

 

 

 

“Jerry, Tom, Donna just stay calm,” Ben says. He nods to Ron who has already retreived his handgun from where he keeps it in a box above the refrigerator. He hands the second one to Andy who looks more collected than Ben would have imagined he would be.

 

 

 

Ben waits for the two men to take positions that give them a clear shot of the door. There is no window that will give them a clean look at who is there. There is a second knock and Ben takes a deep breath before calling out, “Who are you?"

 

 

 

“Ben, it’s me Chris. Let me in."

 

 

 

Ben exhales and closes his eyes, “Why should I do that?"

 

 

 

“I’m here to talk."

 

 

 

“You’re working with Grist and Zale. Why should we believe anything you have to say?"

 

 

 

Chris shouts it through the door, “Because I can tell Leslie about her father. I can tell you who Grace is."

 

 

 

A door opens, but it isn’t Ben. It is Leslie. She looks like she has seen a ghost. She’s handed Grace off to Ann or April who are smart enough to stay hidden. Ben shakes his head, “Leslie, you can’t believe a word he says."

 

 

 

“My father…Grace…,” she licks her lips, “We can finally begin to get answers."

 

 

 

“Leslie, he stood there and watched Grist stab me. He let Jean-Ralphio bleed out."

 

 

 

“We…I could get answers. If we know we can protect her. We can keep her safe."

 

 

 

“He was  _my best friend_ ,” Ben feels a heaviness in his chest, “but he is a traitor."

 

 

 

“I don’t care,” she moves to step around Ben, to go for the door, but Ben grabs her wrists. She elbows him in the gut, “I don’t care!” She shouts. She breaks his grip and from the look on her face Ben is hesitant to try again, but he holds his ground between her and the door.

 

 

 

“That’s enough!” Ron bellows, “The man is here. There are more of us than him. We might as well hear him out."

 

 

 

“This is a mistake,” Ben says

 

 

 

“What do you think we should do?” Leslie exclaims, “Kill him? Wait for him to wander away?"

 

 

 

Ben doesn’t really have an answer. He looks from Ron to April and Ann who stand in the doorway. He looks at Donna, Jerry, and Tom who sit petrified around the fireplace. And to Andy who looks sad.

 

 

 

“Dude, she’s right,” he says.

 

 

 

“Fine,” Ben says. He touches Leslie’s wrist, “Are you sure? He’s only going to lie to you."

 

 

 

She walks to Andy and takes the gun out of his hands. Ben hears Ann gasp and it occurs to him that she doesn’t know this Leslie. She doesn’t know the Leslie who knows how to handle a gun and does not flinch when she discovers her father isn’t who she thought he was. But Ben knows this Leslie and he reminds himself that even if he can’t trust Chris anymore, he can trust her.

 

 

 

So he steps aside. He stays right behind her as she unlocks the door and slips it open.

 

 

 

Chris stands in the door way, a backpack slung over his shoulder. Unlike the rest of them he looks unchanged from the way he did seven months ago. He’s gotten his hair cut and he is clean shaven. But then Ben looks closer and he sees the deep lines that have formed on his former friend’s face. Their eyes meet, but Ben has to look away. It hurts too much.

 

 

 

Chris looks at Leslie. He gives her a small smile, “Leslie Knope."

 

 

 

But he gets no further. Leslie raises the gun and points it at his chest, “Talk,” she says.

 

 

 

“Your father did not set off those bombs. He and Grist were trying to stop the person who did."

 

 

 

“And Grace?"

 

 

 

“She is your niece. You had or have a sister. I don’t know which. Grist never told me if she survived the bombs. Your father sent Grist here to leave Grace with you. To keep her safe. Pawnee was too small and insignificant to be hit by the bombs.”

 

 

 

Even Ben can’t read how the information hits Leslie. She doesn’t move. She doesn’t lower the gun or react. She doesn’t even blink.

 

 

 

“And you?"

 

 

 

Here Chris smiles the smile Ben remembers - the one he flashed the first time Ben had met him and Chris said, “Hey buddy!” That smile, all teeth, reached his eyes. It had been the image Ben had in his head when he thought of his partner. Chris was a smile that reached his eyes. At least he had been. Now, Ben doesn’t know what he is.

 

 

 

“I’m here to help you keep Grace safe.”


	4. Chapter 4

Leslie lowers the gun, “Alright."

 

 

“Alright?"

 

 

 

“Alright!"

 

 

 

The last is from Chris and the other, Ben. Leslie hands the gun back to Ron and wipes her hands on her thighs, “Alright,” she says to both men, “you can stay. You are going to tell us everything you know about Grist and…Zale. You’re going to be honest and if we catch you lying once do not think I will hesitate to use that gun on you."

 

 

 

Ben grips her elbow, “Leslie, can we talk about this?"

 

 

 

“I’ve made up my mind."

 

 

 

“But this is something we should all talk about,” he says, “he puts us all at risk."

 

 

 

“I’d rather have him here than out there,” she counters, “besides he has information we need in order to stop those men."

 

 

 

“Leslie, stopping them is not the point."

 

 

 

“Then what is the point?"

 

 

 

“To keep Grace safe,” he rubs the crook of her elbow as if to silently add herself to his list.

 

 

 

“And Grace isn’t going to be safe until the men who want her are stopped."

 

 

 

Ben switches tactics. He gestures toward the rest of the room, “Don’t you guys have an opinion in this?"

 

 

 

“I trust Leslie,” April says and everyone nods in agreement.

 

 

 

Leslie puts a hand on his chest, “This is our best option,” she says.

 

 

 

“No,” Ben shakes his head, “I won’t allow it."

 

 

 

“Fine, then I want to use my veto,” she says, “I want Chris to stay and I’ll use my veto if I have too."

 

 

 

Ben looks at her with disbelief, but Leslie holds her chin high. She knows she might be a fool, but she can feel it in her gut that this is the right thing to do. It is the same feeling she had the morning she took Grace from the hospital and when she decided to go back to Pawnee. She may be a fool for letting Chris stay, but since the bombs it is the only way she knows how to survive.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The first night Chris spends in the cabin Ben sits up all night. Grace is nestled between them in the bed. Leslie sleeps like a rock because she’s Leslie. But Ben can’t sleep. He stares at the door and strains his ears for footsteps. He stares and does not let himself think. Not about Chris or how if something were to happen to Grace or Leslie Ben would go out of his mind.

 

 

 

He stares at the door in the blue ink light and waits. He waits because it is only a matter of time before Chris betrays them all. Ben knows it.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

It is Ann who is the first to show Chris any kindness. It is a quiet gesture, just a plate of eggs and bacon next to his bed on the couch. That and a cup of strong coffee.

 

 

 

Ron watches her do this from the doorway of their bedroom. He stirred when she rose  and would normally drift back to sleep. He knows she likes time in the early morning to herself. The only time the cabin is quiet is in those few moments between sunrise and daylight. But with Chris in the cabin, Ron can’t let her out of his sight.

 

 

 

“You can just come out,” she says as she walks back to the kitchen, “I see you there."

 

 

 

He clears his throat and stands in the middle of the kitchen, “I don’t like this."

 

 

 

“But you didn’t fight Leslie on it."

 

 

 

“Neither did you."

 

 

 

Ann crosses her arms and leans her back against the counter, “I trust Leslie’s instincts. I don’t always agree with her, but I trust her gut. And her gut is the best information we have. When you have to make a blind choice you have to go with trust."

 

 

 

“He helped Grist shoot that Jean-Ralphio kid."

 

 

 

“Even Ben admits he doesn’t know whose gun went off. It could have been his. It was an accident and while I’m not saying Chris is innocent I am willing to hear him out,” she flips eggs and bacon. The smell is heavenly and Ron almost lets it drop. He doesn’t want to ruin this perfect morning - Ann, him, and all the eggs and bacon they had.

 

 

 

But he has to ask it.

 

 

 

“Is this cause you two used to date?"

 

 

 

“Excuse me?"

 

 

 

“Your willingness…do you think it is because you dated the guy?"

 

 

 

“First, we dated for like two seconds. Second, he lied to me just like Ben did to Leslie,” she frowns, “And third, are you saying I can’t make a call without my feelings getting in the way?"

 

 

 

Yeah, he should have just shut up.

 

 

 

“I…uh…I was just…um you see…” Ron closes eyes, “I’m an idiot."

 

 

 

“Yeah an idiot who can go get more firewood,” she shoves his coat at him, “and why don’t you stay out there for a while."

 

 

 

And to think he could have had a quiet meal of eggs and bacon with Ann. Now everything is terrible and he hates everything.

 

 

 

**

 

 

 

Leslie used to have this great oversized gavel. It was mahogany and shellacked until it shone. She would convene senate meetings with her stuffed animals and Barbies with that gavel. As everyone settles, plates of eggs and cups of coffee balanced on knees, she wonders where that gavel went. Last time she saw it it was in her basement. Had someone raided her basement by now? Would anyone but her have a regular need for an oversized gavel.

 

 

 

“Leslie,” Ann looks at her now, “it’s your show."

 

 

 

Chris sits alone on the couch. He concentrates on scooping food into his mouth. Ben emerges from their bedroom with Grace held tight in his arms.

 

 

 

Chris smiles at the baby, “She’s cute. I’d never actually seen her. Has those blue Knope eyes."

 

 

 

Ben’s jaw clenches and Leslie knows this is killing him. He has bags under his eyes from not sleeping. They had already gone through everything Chris had on his person. Before they went to bed last night they took his boots and parka should he try to run he wouldn’t get far in the middle of winter.

 

 

 

“Don’t talk about Grace,” Leslie snaps, “just answer my questions."

 

 

 

“That’s why I’m here. To help."

 

 

 

“Bullshit,” Donna muses. She doesn’t even look up from filing her nails.

 

 

 

“What do you want to know?"

 

 

 

Leslie consults the list of questions she made last night before bed, “Let’s start at the beginning. Why did you go to Indianapolis?"

 

 

 

“I recognized Grist on the security footage and headed to Indianapolis cause he knew the area. Plus a bomb didn't hit it even though it is a pretty major city. I thought maybe he wanted to leave it intact, to use as a base."

 

 

 

“How did you find him?” this was from Ben.

 

 

 

“I didn’t find him. He found me."

 

 

 

“And how did he convince you to work for him?"

 

 

 

Chris smiles, “How do you know I’ve been working for him? I could be undercover. Getting him to trust me so I can get information."

 

 

 

“Don’t play games with us,” Ann snaps.

 

 

 

Chris’ smile fades and quickly he sobers up. He sets the plate aside. His hands are open, palms up, and he says, “They have proof of who set off the bombs."

 

 

 

Ben snorts, “This should be good."

 

 

 

But Chris doesn’t even look up. He stares directly at Leslie. It is her he has to convince, “Before I tell you, you’ve got to understand there is a whole war going on outside of Pawnee. The country has split into factions. Militias have taken over. Last time I heard there were six or seven, but they change all the time. They claim a territory and raid it for weapons and food. There is a central government outside of D.C., but it is weak and desperate. All over the place people are hungry and scared. No one has enough medicine. People die from the an infected scratch. From the flu. It is chaos. I mean what you’ve done with Pawnee, Leslie, is amazing."

 

 

 

 

 

“Don’t talk to her,” Ben takes two steps, but Leslie holds up a hand. He stops and shifts Grace from one hip to the next.

 

 

 

“Just tell us who set off the bombs, Chris."

 

 

 

“The government in D.C. is run by a guy named Tommy Nelson."

 

 

 

Leslie sits up, “You mean the former head of the CIA?"

 

 

 

“Yes. Almost all of our elected officials were killed in the bombings. In the chaos, Nelson took over. He’s got the military behind him."

 

 

 

“And he is the guy Grist and Zale blame for the bombings?"

 

 

 

“Yes."

 

 

 

Leslie touches a hand to her forehead, “And what does this have to do with us? I mean why would this guy care about Pawnee? About Grace?"

 

 

 

Chris shrugs, “I don’t know that. Zale and Grist didn’t tell me everything. They just said Nelson is looking for Grace and Zale had to get her out of D.C.. Like I said, he had Grist bring her here to you, Leslie, cause he knew you would keep her safe."

 

 

 

“You said I have a sister."

 

 

 

“Grist said the baby is your niece. I don’t know why he would lie about that."

 

 

 

“What are you doing here now?” Until now April has said nothing, but she stares without blinking at Chris. Leslie bites the inside of her cheek when she sees Chris shrink a bit under April’s direct stare, “I mean, why ditch them and show up to help us? Seems weird."

 

 

 

Chris looks at the floor. He interlocks his hands. His adam’s apple is pronounced as he lifts his head and stares toward Ben, “I missed my friend. I missed a partner,” then he looks at Leslie, “You’ve got to know…I didn’t know Zale was your father until Ben accused Grist. I didn’t know they were capable of such violence until after that kid was dead. It killed me having to leave Ben there bleeding in the diner. We were just supposed to be a distraction. Zale wanted to check on Grace. We were going to distract Ben and then head out of town. Nothing was supposed to happen. I am just as much a victim of their lies are you are, Leslie.”

 

 

 

She hears Ben’s cry of outrage, but she can’t really see it. Her eyes are blurred with tears and she stands. Ann stands too, touches her arm, but Leslie brushes her away. She stumbles out of the cabin, forgetting a coat, and takes off running across the snowy field. Leslie hates running, but what she hates even more is the burning in her chest. The rage and grief that threatens to eat her from the inside out.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Ben finds Leslie in the woods. She leans against a tree trunk, bent over, and cries into her hands. He slows as he approaches her, but she doesn’t indicate she can hear him. She doesn’t stop or slow her tears as he slips her coat over her shoulders and pulls her against his chest.

 

 

 

“Let it out,” he whispers into her hair, “just let it all out."

 

 

 

He can feel her hands fist his sweater and it just kills him. He leans the two of them against the tree trunk and stands steady until she stops crying.

 

 

 

“I hate him, Ben,” she whispers finally, “I hate my own father. I hate who I think he is.  I hate who I know he is. The only part of him I don’t hate are my memories of him and those were all a lie."

 

 

 

Ben cups her cheeks and tilts her eyes to meet his, “Those memories are not a lie to you. They were real for you and that is all that matters. No one can take that away from you."

 

 

 

“Do you think my mom knew?” she asks, “that he was really alive."

 

 

 

He wishes he could honestly say no, but the best he can muster is a pathetic, “I don’t know."

 

 

 

This only makes her cry harder and Ben feels completely helpless. Helpless to fix it. Helpless to do anything but hold her tight.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

April finds Chris in the woodshed. He is struggling with the ax and she watches him for almost twenty minutes before she makes a noise. It really is a neat trick Ben taught her, the walking soundlessly thing.

 

 

 

She cocks the gun and that is what gets his attention. He is about to swing the ax down but he stops mid-swing.

 

 

 

“April Ludgate,” he drops the ax and stands there.

 

 

 

“It’s Ludgate-Dwyer now."

 

 

 

“Congratulations."

 

 

 

“Why are you really here?"

 

 

 

He smiles, “To help protect Grace. To help my friends."

 

 

 

“Bullshit."

 

 

 

“If I was lying, why would I admit it to you?"

 

 

 

“If you hurt any of them I will kill you. They might hesitate, but I won’t."

 

 

 

“I have no doubt of that."

 

 

 

“Cause they’re my family. They’re the only family I have left."

 

 

 

“I am glad,” Chris says, “I’m glad at least one person has found the chance to be happy in this new world."

 

 

 

April tries to ignore the thought that Chris looks a little sad when he says it.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Chris is with them for three weeks before someone says what Leslie has been waiting for. Three weeks of tiptoeing around him. Three weeks of sleepless nights and clutching Grace close. The atmosphere is thick. No one laughs and every night people retreat to their rooms earlier and earlier. Leslie hunches over a binder. She fills it with questions and memories. She is trying to piece together the truth which is rent like cloth. Spare threads trail across the lists she makes. She interviews Chris over and over trying to catch him in a lie, but the man is consistent. He is calm and gracious and does not seem to care that everyone hates him. That none of them trust him.

 

 

 

It is Andy who finally says what Leslie has been waiting for.

 

 

 

“When are we going back to Pawnee?” he asks. Leslie is at the kitchen table and Andy lounges on the couch, April curled into his lap, as he plays tug of war with Champion, “Don’t you have like mayor duties or something?”

 

 

 

“We can’t leave,” April sits up, “What are we going to do with Chris?"

 

 

 

“Leave him here."

 

 

 

“Ron and Ann are the only ones who would stay. It wouldn’t be safe."

 

 

 

“Then bring him with,” he shrugs, “I mean the dude has been totally cooperative. How long until we trust him?"

 

 

 

“It doesn’t work like that Andy,” Leslie says.

 

 

 

“I just think at some point trust is a choice,” he wins the rope toy from Champion and throws it across the room. The dog lunges for it. Andy looks at Leslie, “I thought you knew that."

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

“No!"

 

 

 

“Ben, we’ve got to go back. We just abandoned Pawnee."

 

 

 

“If we take Chris with us he could expose this place. And this is our only advantage if Zale comes looking for Grace. We can hide here."

 

 

 

“You mean we can run."

 

 

 

“Yes! Run if it means surviving."

 

 

 

“But when are we going to stop trying to survive and actually live? Our lives are back in Pawnee. They aren’t here."

 

 

 

“I think this is a bad idea."

 

 

 

“If you want to use your veto then I will stay with you."

 

 

 

“You’ve already polled everyone, didn’t you?"

 

 

 

“Yes and only you and April are against it."

 

 

 

“But she’ll go because of Andy."

 

 

 

“Yeah."

 

 

 

“Fine."

 

 

 

“I love you!"

 

 

 

“I love you too."

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Later, Leslie will go over the steps one by one. She obsess over them in the aftermath until all of it blurs into one terrible nightmare.

 

 

 

It is Ben’s idea to take different routes. Two cars. The first would be him, April, Jerry, Donna, and Tom. They would take the main road. On the off chance someone sees them they will distract while Leslie, Andy, and Chris take the truck the back way into Pawnee.

 

 

 

The question is who will take Grace. Ben insists she should stay with him. Andy points out that if Ben’s car is meant to be the distraction wouldn’t it be safer for Grace to be with Leslie? But it is Leslie who convinces Ben to let her take Grace. She cannot let her go, she says and because there is no one he trusts to keep Grace safe more than Leslie, he agrees.

 

 

 

In the end, Leslie straps the baby to her chest and kisses Ben hard on the mouth before she and Chris and Andy set out on their hike back to that farm house where the truck is parked. Under the cover of night, Leslie lets herself exhale. They move through the woods silently and the whole thing is almost peaceful. She thinks about her mother and how they used to go star gazing in Ramsett Park. When Grace is older, Leslie thinks, that is something she’ll do with her.

 

 

 

Andy drives and Chris sits in the middle while Leslie takes the passenger side. No one talks as Andy navigates the roads without lights. They feel every pot hole. Inhale at every cross road as if outside the cabin car monsters lurk.

 

 

 

“I wish there was a moon tonight,” Andy says, “it’s creepy with no moon."

 

 

 

But the world is thick with darkness and they cannot see beyond what is right in front of them.

 

 

 

When they reach the  _Welcome to Pawnee_  sign Leslie strokes Grace’s head. She is asleep against Leslie’s chest.

 

 

 

“She is a sweet baby,” Chris says, “a really sweet baby."

 

 

 

“She is,” Leslie offers a smile to Chris, “I’m glad you’re here. I want you to know that. Everyone deserves a second chance.”  
  
  
  
  
"Dude," Andy says, "Leslie's awesome. She totally gave me a second chance and now look at me! Hot wife. Deputy sheriff. My life is great!"

  
  
  


"Yeah," Chris says, "Seems to be."  
  
  
  
  
Leslie smiles at both of them and looks down at Grace sleeping against her chest. Second chances were everything. Everything.

  
  
  
  


And then Leslie feels the world spin. It hurdles her and she thinks for a second she it flying. She throws her arms up around Grace and feels the sharp pain of something hitting against her head. There is a screeching and shouts and every sensation spills into one another. It keeps spilling like sand poured from a bucket. She is loose and heavy. Then she is tight and weightless.The strap of her seatbelt pulls hard and anchors her to the seat but everything else moves in any direction it wants.

 

 

 

And then it is over and everything is black.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

When Leslie Knope wakes up she is still strapped in the seat of the truck. She can feel before she can see.

 

 

 

Two firm hands grab her wrists, “Easy there kitten, you’re going to hurt worse if you move."

 

 

 

As her vision comes back to her she is looking into the haggard face of Harvey Grist. He leans through the hole where the passenger door used to be. Leslie moves her feet and hears glass crack beneath her boots"

 

 

 

“Grace,” she coughs, “Where is my baby?"

 

 

 

Grist sighs, “Your father said you were too trusting. I really didn’t think Chris would pull it off, but by golly he did."

 

 

 

“WHERE THE HELL IS MY BABY?"

 

 

 

Grist just grips her tighter. Leslie tries to kick her legs but a pain shoots up her left ankle, “I told you to stay still,” he mutters, “Your baby is safer with Chris Traeger than she is with you or that idiot boyfriend of yours. Trust me."

 

 

 

She inhales and smells the tangy scent of blood. It is metallic and sends panic coursing through her.

 

 

 

“Andy? Where is Andy?"

 

 

 

Grist steps out of her purview and when he does Leslie sees Andy. She sees him lying in the middle of the road, body bent and broken. She sees the hole in the windshield where he went flying through it. She sees the pool of blood circling his head like an angry halo.

 

 

 

“ANDY!"

 

 

 

Grist lets her go and Leslie claws her way past him. She ignores the seering pain in her ankle and trembles toward her friend’s body, “No, you’re going to be fine,” she touches his hand and then his shoulder. His face is so peaceful, as if he had simply fallen asleep in the sun. She shakes him, but there is nothing. She falls to her knees alongside him and grips his hand in her own. It is his left one and the metal of his wedding band is cold against her palms. She cries and cries as Grist watches on. But Leslie doesn’t care because in that moment the entire world has gone cold. Dead and cold.

 

***

When April was a girl she never doodled her name next a boy’s.

  
She didn’t giggle at school dances. Hell, she never went to a school dance except for that one time her mom made her. They dropped her off at the curb and said if she survived one dance she didn’t have to go to her grandmother’s for summer vacation. April spent the whole night pressed against the gym doors staring people down. After that her parents stopped trying to impress their version of happiness onto her. They never understood her, but at least they accepted her. 

April knows she is different. She knows it and counts it as a strength because when you are different you have to learn the company of your own shadow. The world isn’t made for you. No one is going to do you any favors. It is just you in your corner and to April that is awesome because people are dumb. You’re better off alone. 

Then the bombs happened and April discovers that to survive you need people in that corner with you. You need someone to show you how to chart your surroundings and another someone to give you hope. You need people to remind you to smile once in a while. And most of all you need someone to survive  _for_. That person presses you into his side when it is cold out and croons in your ear. He tucks your hair behind your ear and you roll your eyes, but he smiles and you smile too cause his smile you believe. His smile tugs belief out of you. To him you aren’t different. You’re an angel without wings. Not a person exactly, but something awesome and otherworldly. 

“You’re the best thing in this world babe,” he whispered your ear your first time together. 

He said it again those nights in the bunker as the rain pinged overhead. He rubbed your arm up and down with his wide hand. After a few minutes he stopped and you gripped his stretched out t-shirt collar between your fingers. 

“Please, don’t stop,” you said, “it feels right.” 

It did feel right, the weight of his hand on your arm and the motion. It was constant and steady. Andy was the constant you didn’t know you needed to survive. In this world or the one before or the one after it. You hate most things, but you never seem to hate him. He is the one thing that keeps you from hating everything. 

“You’re the best thing in this world babe.” 

***

Ben is going to go out of his mind. 

If he stops moving something will snap. If he stops he will feel. He will think of how Grace held his hand this morning in her two small ones. She traced his fingers and gummed, “Dadadada.” He will remember the sweet curve of her cheek and the way she smelled like lotion and sunshine and the peas she had for dinner last night. If he stops and feels then his knees will buckle. 

And every minute is another one Chris puts between Ben and his daughter. 

So he doesn’t feel. He leaves Leslie curled on her bed. Vaguely he thinks she should change out of her clothes. They are wet from snow and sticky from blood. But he doesn’t stop to tell her that. He goes to the little office where he slept all those months when they were pretending. He pulls the trunk out and takes the key out from underneath his shirt where it hangs on a chain. 

Leslie never liked that he always wore it. 

“It’s too close to your heart,” she said, “I don’t like the idea of that.” 

But that is always the difference between them, right? The things they kept close to their hearts. He is the agent. He is the one who did what needed to be done. Leslie built things. She inspired people. He kept them all alive. It wasn’t until Grace that they found something to hold close together. 

It only takes twenty minutes to put together a pack. To arm himself. He doesn’t stop moving. He doesn’t hesitate in the hall outside Leslie’s bedroom. He keeps moving because otherwise he is going to go out of his mind. 

He takes the stairs two at a time to the living room. April is curled around Champion on the couch. Tom sits a few feet away watching her carefully. Donna comes in from the kitchen carrying two mugs of coffee. 

“Ben, what are you doing?” She says

He ignores her and crouches down in front of April. 

After Leslie and Andy failed to show up at the house it was Ben and April who went back out looking for them. They traced the planned route until they came upon Leslie, alone, with Andy’s head in her lap. When they got Leslie into the car it was April who made the decision about the body. 

“There will be too many questions if we try to bring him back to Pawnee,” she said. 

“Ron and Ann will take care of him,” Ben touched her shoulder.  

Her voice was so calm. So rational and quiet, “He liked it at the cabin anyway,” she said, “it was where we were happy. He belongs there.” 

They loaded the body into the broken truck. It wasn’t perfect. The side was sheared off from where Grist had run his car into it. That must have been the plan to get Andy to stop. But it would have to shelter Andy’s body until Ron and Ann could come and get him. 

Ben folded his friend’s hands over one another and looked the man in the face. He looked so peaceful, almost like he had fallen asleep on the couch. Silently Ben thanked him for protecting Grace up until the end and stepped back. April lingered only a second longer. She slipped the wedding ring off Andy’s finger. Ben watched and the irony of it caught in his throat. He almost laughed. The ring had been Leslie’s father. 

April twists the ring now. She looks at it and Ben looks at her. 

“I’m going after Grace,” he says, “Do you want to come with?” 

“Are you batshit crazy?” this is Donna and she moves toward them, “she’s a child. Her husband is dead.”

Ben says nothing. April Ludgate-Dwyer is not a child, he thinks. Everyone always under estimates her. Tom stands up. He blocks Donna’s path to April and Ben looks back at April. 

“You don’t have to come,” Ben says, “but I could use back up. It’ll take too long to get Ron and Leslie broke her ankle in the crash. I need to leave now. Do you want to come with?” 

She looks up at him now. 

“Can I kill him?” 

“Chris?” 

“Yeah.” 

Ben’s throat tightens, “I’ll hand you the gun myself.” 

“Then let’s go.” 

He stands back and April gets up. Champion follows at her heels into the bedroom she had shared with Andy. 

“You did not just do that,” Donna blusters, “All of you are lunatics!” She backs away and disappears upstairs. 

Ben waits while Tom and Jerry watching in silence. There are a thousand things he wants to say and all of them end with  _but he has Grace_. There is no reality more important than that. April takes ten minutes and Ben glances toward the stairs. He should go and say goodbye, but he can’t. She is just like Grace. With her he feels everything and he can’t stop moving. He can’t feel because if he does he will go out of his mind. 

“In the morning, hike back to the cabin,” Ben says to the room, “Stay off the main roads. Get Ron and Ann. The truck and…Andy are a quarter mile east of the intersection of Route 10 and Highway M.” 

“Ben,” Jerry calls out. 

“Yeah?” 

“If it were my daughter I’d do the same thing.” 

It’s the things we keep close to our hearts, Ben thinks later. April drives Donna’s Benz along abandoned highways. She has to navigate around cars that litter the lanes. The lights cut through the night and Ben sits in the passenger seat feeling the rhythm of the wheels on pavement. They just have to keep moving. They are headed toward Indianapolis. Chris spent months there. Grist hid there in the wake of the bombs. It is their best lead. 

It is the things we keep close to our hearts that make us who we are, he thinks, and can unravel us just as fast. 

*** 

It is Ann who pulls them all through the next few days. 

Ron watches her carefully for the sway of exhaustion. She still hasn’t recovered fully from her illness. She tires easily and every night she falls asleep in her clothes. She never even climbs under the quilts. He takes her tennis shoes off and lifts her so her head rests on his chest. He laces his fingers through hers and thinks about the first days after the bombs. Then it had been her quiet strength and capable hands that caught his attention. 

That same strength gets them through the next few days. 

It is those hands that pull Leslie from her bed and clean her up. They bandage her ankle and grip shoulders when Leslie tries to leave. To follow after Ben. They hold her down and finally drug her to get her to stay. Later it is Ann who brings tea and makes the decision to cremate Andy’s body. The ground is too frozen to bury him. They will bury him in the spring, she says, in the field by the cabin. April will do it and they will do it with her. It is Ann who comes up with a story to tell Howser and Joan when word gets out that Leslie has come back to town. 

Ron does things too. He remains steady and unaffected as possible at the thought of that little girl being stolen. He does what needs to be done, but it is Ann who directs them like a captain steering a crew through a storm. With capable hands she touches shoulders and soothes Leslie when the tears just won’t stop. 

Ron has always been attracted to strong women, but it isn’t until Ann that he begins to realize that strength isn’t a force. It isn’t something external and intimidating. Strength is endurance. It is presence of mind and capable hands. It is quiet and empathetic. 

It is something Ann is teaching him. 

*** 

When Harvey Grist turns up in her living room Leslie has the vague thought that no one but her recognizes him. No one left in Pawnee has ever seen him, but her. 

He knocks on her front door and Ann lets him in. Leslie lies on the couch, hazy from the sleeping pill Ann gave her, but not really sleeping because all sleep brings is nightmares. 

“Leslie, someone is here to see you. Says he used to work with you,” Ann says, “I’m going to get coffee for us.” 

Leslie sits up and rubs her eyes. She realizes that Grist is sitting on her coffee table, hands on his knees, watching her carefully. She wishes she didn’t, but she gasps. Scoots back as if that would make a difference. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” She whispers. 

“That depends,” he says.  

“One word and my friends will put a bullet in your head.” 

He looks toward the kitchen where they can hear Ann going through the cupboards, “Then you lose your best chance of getting your girl back.” 

“You could have killed her.” 

“I didn’t hit your truck that hard. Your friend lost control. He freaked out.” 

“You’re not seriously blaming Andy.” 

“His death was an accident.”

“I don’t believe you.” 

“That’s fine,” Grist shrugs, “but I’m still your best hope.” 

“You were in on the kidnapping!” 

“She’s safer out of Pawnee,” he leans over Leslie. She forces herself not to tremble, “Nelson found out about you and he figured out we hid her here with you. We had to get her out.” 

“Thomas Nelson? Chris said he runs what’s left of the government outside of D.C.” 

“You’ll figure out pretty quickly all the militias claim to be the government. He just has the biggest arsenal.” 

“But what does he want with Grace?” 

Grist scratches his ear, “He’s her father.” 

Leslie opens her mouth. Closes it again. Grist snorts and leans forward, “Now that I’ve got your attention. I’ve got a proposition for you.” 

And Leslie is desperate. She never told them that Grist stayed after Chris left. It didn’t seem important at the time, but here he is in her living room. And Leslie can’t follow after Ben. She can’t bury Andy. All she can do is make a deal with the devil himself. 

She crosses her arms and says, “I’m listening.” 

*** 

Chris always wanted that boring suburban life with the minivan and soccer games and a house full of kids. He had assumed he would have that life, but somewhere along the way time got away from him. There was always another case. Another town. And then the bombs went off and he found himself at the end of Grist’s gun. 

An ordinary life. A family. Happiness seems like a faraway concept after that. 

But still he savors the warmth of the baby strapped to his chest as he picks his way into the apartment building in Indianapolis. Grist gave him the address when he pulled Chris from the wreck. He forced him to stop trying to give Andy CPR, “He’s dead,” Grist swore. 

“This wasn’t supposed to happen!” Chris shouted. He meant all of it. He had wanted an ordinary life.  

“You don’t have time,” Grist shoved the keys into his hands. He rescued the screaming Grace from the wreck and buckled her into the car seat. He pushed Chris into the driver’s seat and told him to drive. Drive until he got to the apartment. 

“One of our guys is there,” Grist said, “he’ll help you keep her safe. Keep her safe until we contact you. No matter what. Keep her safe.” 

Now Chris focuses on her sleeping head resting on his chest. She is finally quiet. It took a small dose of sleeping medicine. Even after two days she still cries for Leslie and Ben. 

He knocks on the apartment door. There are footsteps, a pause, and then someone unlocks the door. It is a man. He’s tall with shaggy hair. He shifts his jaw and looks at Grace. 

“You must be Chris,” he says, “Grist said you’d be here yesterday.” 

“I got hung up,” Chris steps into the apartment. It is dark. The windows are covered with blankets nailed into the drywall. But it is warm and the guy has electricity from a generator that hums quietly in the corner. Chris turns to the man, “He said you’d help me keep her safe. Said you had a personal stake in all of this.” 

The man folds his arms across his chest, “I owe Leslie Knope,” he says, “She used to be my friend. Back before the bombs. I quit on her once before. I figure this is my chance to make it up to her. Name is Mark Brendanawicz. ”

 

***

 

“Leslie?”

 

“In here.”

Leslie hears Ann’s footfalls in the doorway to her bedroom. She drops the digital camera and it bounces onto the bed.  She wipes her eyes with the heel of her palms, tries to sit straight, and hopes she will look composed.

Ann frowns, “Leslie, how’d you get up here?”

“I used the crutches. It wasn’t graceful, but I did it.”

Her best friend sinks down next to Leslie on the bed, “You know if you need anything me or Ron can get it for you.” Ann squeezes Leslie’s hand.

“I know. I just wanted a minute.”

They both look at the digital camera sitting on the bed.

“Were you looking at pictures of Grace?”

Leslie picks up the camera and turns it in her hands, “They’re all I have. We took them but we don’t have anyway to develop them so they’re just stuck inside this machine.”

“Ben and April went to get her back.”

“It’s been three days.”

“And they may have her right now. They may be heading back to Pawnee this very moment.”

Leslie nods. She knows Ann is trying. She should try to hold out hope, but she can’t. She can’t just sit here and hope. She has to do something, but with a broken ankle its not like she can catch up with them. And she doesn’t want to think about the fact that Ben didn’t even try to say goodbye. She doesn’t want to analyze why he left her curled up on the bed, Andy’s blood still staining her clothes, and walked out into the night to find Grace. She thought they were partners, but apparently not.

“She’s my daughter, Ann,” Leslie whispers, “She’s as much my daughter as if I carried her myself.”

“I know.”

Leslie takes a deep, shuddering breath, “And if I fail to protect her…if something were to happen to her…I can’t. I can’t face that.”

“Hey,” Ann leans until her face fills Leslie’s purview, “Ben and April are going to bring her back. No one loves her like you and Ben and he is going to find her. It’s what he does.”

It is what he does. Ben is the agent. He is the one who has kept them alive. He will find Grace. He will. Leslie doesn’t doubt that.

But there is still a threat that looms over Grace’s head. Leslie doesn’t know if Chris was telling the truth when he claimed that Grist and her father really were the good guys. She doesn’t know if Grist is being honest when he says Grace’s biological father is Thomas Nelson and that he will hunt the baby down. He is the bad guy, Grist keeps telling her.

Leslie presses her hands to her eyes, but the tears are right there. She can’t stop them. Ann wraps her arms around Leslie and holds fast. Leslie lets her. She soaks up the comfort as if it were warmth.

“I know you’re worried,” Ann soothes, “but it’ll be okay. I know it will be.”

Leslie  _is_  worried. She is worried sick, but her tears are from guilt. Guilt about what she is about to do.

With so many shifting truths there is no way for Leslie to see the right choice. She thinks of Andy and what he said. At some point, trust is a choice. The world can’t be split into pro-con lists. So sometimes you have to make a choice even if you don’t have all the information. Leslie is choosing to trust. She is choosing to trust herself. It is a wild, scary thing because the last time she did Andy died. But Leslie believes the best way to honor Andy is to listen to him so keeps hacking away at the guilt and doubt.. She needs a mental machete to do so, but she tries to focus on what she knows.

She knows that even if they get Grace back there are people who will try to take her again and again. A storm can hit you once and even if you manage to survive, what about the next one? Constantly living a step ahead of disaster is not living. It is surviving and Leslie wants Grace to have a life, not a mere existence. The world is already broken. Leslie can’t let her daughter live under siege.

Grist has given her the opportunity to end it once and for all. She doesn’t trust him, but she fears a half life for Grace more. She fears her daughter living in hideouts and learning to kill to defend herself. She fears Grace will always be looking over her shoulder. She fears that reality much more than she distrusts Grist. So Leslie is taking a calculated risk. She knows it is foolish, but she is going to do it because she still trusts her gut. And her gut tells her to do this and to do it alone. She can’t risk Ann or Ron or anyone else getting hurt on account of her. Andy was one casualty too many. She knows her friends would follow her into the fray, but this is her choice - as a mother - to ensure a future for her daughter. It is a choice she has to make alone.

And she is trying to tell Ann that. She is trying to tell Ann without telling her the truth. Leslie hates lying. She was furious at Ben for months for lying to her about his past. She doesn’t want to lie to Ann, but she knows if she tells her the truth Ann would get Ron to stop Leslie and nothing is going to stop Leslie.

So she pretends to feel better. She lets Ann hug her and she leans against Ann’s shoulder as they go downstairs. She encourages Ron to take Ann for a walk after dinner. Without the din of electricity the stars glow so bright now. She recommends they take the long path through Ramset Park and not to worry about her. She’ll manage for a few hours by herself.

And when they are gone, Leslie slips the digital camera into her knapsack. She rewraps her ankle and checks to make sure she has all of Ann’s pain killers. Then she sneaks out to the alley behind her house. She hobbles down to the third garage on the left and just like Grist told her he is inside waiting for her.

“You sure you want to do this?” he climbs into the driver’s seat of a shiny black truck. Leslie is left to lift herself and her crutches into the vehicle.

“It’s the only way to make sure Grace stays safe,” Leslie says. She looks at Grist, “And you’re sure she is going to be safe until this deal is made?”

“The people protecting her would put their bodies in front of a bullet to keep her away from Nelson,” Grist says. He rolls out of the garage and into the thick slip of night, “Well, I guess that makes you and I partners Leslie Knope.”

***

Indianapolis is the carcass of a city. The buildings are there, but the details are broken. Windows are shattered and there is no electricity. Vines choke yards and wildlife has broached the perimeter of this new urban wild. The roads are littered with cars where people abandoned them. Ben and April stop a few times to check the gas tanks. They manage to siphon off enough to refill the plastic containers lined up in the trunk of Donna’s Benz.

“Waste not, want not,” Ben tells April, “Another rule in the super secret agent rule book.”

She doesn’t even acknowledge she heard him.

Since they left Pawnee she has not said a word to Ben. He respects her need for silence. He is even grateful for it because he doesn’t know how much space he can fill himself. He isn’t capable of many words right now. Still, he is afraid if she retreats too far into herself she won’t come back.

Ben has no way to judge April now from the girl she was before the bombs. He barely knew her. But he remembers April just a month ago on the night she married Andy. All of them stood beneath the stars. She wore a siren red dress and they nearly froze while Leslie made a speech about love. But what Ben remembers keenly is how April had been happy in an unadulterated way that was rare for her and rarer for the world now. Ben isn’t interested in trying to make April happy again. He is interested in maintaining her ability to get back to that place someday when the hurt is less.

So he forces himself to talk even if he doesn’t want to. He talks while they search the addresses Ben can remember from his file on Grist and Zale.

_“I played shortstop as a kid.”_

_“Cindy Eckhart dumped me right after we got to second base in the custodial closet. I mean, who does that? ”_

_“People don’t realize how hard ventriloquism is, but it is tantamount to an art really.”_

_“Data had never felt this way before. Of course, Data had never felt anything.”_

“I’m going to murder you.”

There it is…three days later and she finally speaks. They are checking an old apartment building Grist kept as a safe house. Ben can’t remember which apartment it is so they are stuck going through every unit. They are in the stairwell when April rounds on him. She is a few steps ahead of him so they are eye to eye.

Ben folds his arms across his chest, “Nice of you to join the world.”

She just stares at him and it takes everything in Ben not to twitch. He isn’t going to back down on this one. There is no sound in the stairwell except their parallel breathing.

She is the one to break eye contact, “Do you miss Leslie?”

“Every moment.” His throat is tight.

“But it is okay because you know she is safe, right? Missing her is hard, but you know you’ll get to go back to her. It makes it bearable.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Well take away the bearable part and you might have a clue what the fuck I’m feeling.”

It is his turn to look down. He shoves his hands in his pockets and rocks a bit on the step. He knows what Leslie would do now. She would lace her fingers through April’s and tug her close. She would make a speech about grief and love and Andy. And it probably would work because she is Leslie. But Ben can’t do that. He slips his backpack off and digs for what he is looking for. When he finds the hunting knife he stretches it toward April. It is sheathed, but under the leather is a wicked 8 inch blade.

“Why are you giving me this?”

“Because if murder is going to make you feel better then you should use this. A gun is too easy. If avenging Andy is going to take the pain away then this will help you really feel it.”

She takes the knife, but for the first time she looks uncomfortable and unsure.

Ben readjusts his backpack and continues climbing the steps. He passes April and says nothing. She is still turning the knife over in her hands.

***

Chris really loves the way Grace smiles. He loves her tiny hands and the way in just three days he taught her to say,  _Chris, Chris, Chris_. What he doesn’t love is when she gums  _Mama_ or  _Dada_. It pains him every time.  She asks for Leslie and Ben throughout the day. He tries to distract her with songs and toys, but she always comes back to  _Mama_ and  _Dada._ She cries and Chris rocks her until her tears smear her cheeks and she falls asleep, dead weight, in his arms. Her head flops over his elbow and he sinks into the couch, defeated.

Mark gives him a sidelong glance every time.

“So your partner and Leslie have been raising this kid since the bombs?”

“Yeah,” Chris strokes a gentle curl on Grace’s head, “I took off for Indianapolis right after the bombs to look for Grist. Ben and I had tracked him to Indiana.”

“And that’s where you got recruited for the grand cause?”

Chris swallows at the memory of the first few days he spent with Grist in that decrepit old apartment in Indianapolis. The man held him at gun point and presented his case. It took weeks before Chris believed it to even be possible.

The attack had come from within the halls of their own government. Thomas Nelson used the CIA to procure the bombs and move them into American cities. He recruited people to set them off within the fall out zone and when the country was still in pieces, he stepped up as the heir apparent. The President, the Vice President, and almost every known congressional official was missing or dead. As the head of Central Intelligence he vowed to track down the terrorists who broke their country and what was left of the military followed.

“How did you get recruited?” Chris asks Mark.

“After the bombs I ended up on the farms around Pawnee,” Mark shrugs, “I met Zale that way. When Leslie became mayor people talked. Zale heard me talking about how I used to know her. I thought about going back and seeing if I could help, but Zale got to me first. He started telling me about Nelson and Leslie and Grace. Like I told you, I owe Leslie Knope a favor and I wasn’t going anywhere living on those farms. Eventually I joined up.”

“Were you friends with Andy Dwyer?” Chris shifts Grace from one arm to the other.

“I was,” Mark tips back his beer, “Sort of. I dated Ann Perkins after she broke up with him. I was going to propose and everything.”

“He’s dead.”

Mark tips his beer back again, swallow hard, and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.

“And it was my fault,” Chris whispers, “I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it is my fault.”

Mark rolls the bottle of beer between both hands, sighs, and hands it across to Chris.

“Shit,” is all he says and Chris swallows the bitter taste of warm, old beer.

_Shit_ was about there was all to say.

***

Leslie sleeps as Grist drives. Exhaustion pulls her there and she dreams of Ben and Grace. He holds Grace tight to his chest and when Leslie extends her arms he refuses to hand her over.

“You left,” dream Ben says, “while I was out saving our daughter you took off with the enemy.”

Leslie tries to respond, but the words are tangled up in her throat.  _He_ left. He left without saying goodbye. He left without talking to her. How could he even say that to her?

But then she is jerked awake and her protests are lost to the ether. Ben and Grace slip away and all she has are the things she wants to say. The truck rumbles over another pothole and Leslie presses a palm to her breastbone.

“Nightmare?” Grist asks. He doesn’t look away from the road.

Leslie shifts in her seat. Outside the world is black. It is still night or the darkest parts of morning, she’s not sure. Their headlights cut through the darkness and Leslie feels her stomach swim as Grist navigates through the abandoned cars on the highway.

“Something like that,” she folds her hands tight across her stomach.

Grist digs into the console between them and hands Leslie a granola bar. She turns the plastic packaging over. It’s been months since she’d had packaged food. Pawnee had long run through its stores. There might be a stray candy bar here or there, but Leslie can’t remember the last time she’s had processed sugar.

“Eat,” Grist orders.

“Did you know,” Leslie starts, “did you know the bombs were coming? Were you and my father prepared for them?”

“It wasn’t an accident I took Grace to Pawnee the day before the bombs went off,” Grist shrugs.

“And you…you stored up on granola bars?” Outrage pushes on her chest, “You could have saved millions of people, but instead you were worried about a single baby?”

“She’s your baby.”

“But still…why didn’t you warn people?”

Grist works his jaw and Leslie just stares at his profile for a long time. This man is her father’s partner. He knows her father better than she does. He seems to move at her father’s will. Who was he?

“Your boy Ben ever tell you how long he and Chris spent tracking us?”

“A year before the bombs,” Leslie stammers, “Ben said he got the case a year before the bombs.”

“Yeah, your dad and I went rogue a year before the bombs  _because no one would believe us_. We walked away so we could try to stop Nelson. You gotta understand your father and I gave up our whole lives to work for the CIA. I never got to have a family. Your dad - he had to walk away from his - twice. That was the cost of serving and we were good with it. We learned to stomach it. But then we started investigating the disappearance of these remote nuclear bombs in post-Soviet countries and our investigation kept leading us back to our own government.

“Your father was the one who figured Nelson out and we tried to take our findings to our supervisors and when we did our homes were burned down. Our cars were tampered with. Even Nelson’s name on a report was enough for him to try to kill us. So we left. We took our evidence and we left. We went underground, but your dad couldn’t stay away from your sister. She didn’t have anyone. Her mom died years ago and so sometimes they would meet in a park somewhere and sit on a bench and talk. I told him it was foolish. Leave Emily out of it, I said.”

Leslie whispers, “I have a sister named Emily?”

“Had. Nelson had her killed,” Grist says, “She was a lot like you. Younger. Maybe more naive, but just as idealistic and hopeful. Your dad was a fool about her. He told her about Nelson. He wanted to explain why he had disappeared from her life. He wanted her to understand why he left. The thing was we didn’t have the smoking gun. We didn’t have Nelson tied to the bombs themselves. Emily was sure there had to be evidence somewhere -  in his office or home. We just couldn’t get in there. The security was too high. The only way in was with Nelson. So she went after him.”

“Went after him?”

“She seduced him. Pretended to fall in love with him,” Grist sighs, “Grace was the result. The happiest accident from a terrible tragedy your father called her.”

“What happened?”

“Your father was furious with Emily, but she got it. She got the evidence. The last time your dad saw her alive she told him she got it. But once she handed it over and once we went to the FBI with it Nelson would know it was her. She was scared for Grace and wanted your dad to make sure she was safe before Emily would turn over the evidence. That’s where me and you and Pawnee came in.

“The problem was your dad was a few days too late. We got it wrong. We thought we had more time. Once Grace was missing - Nelson, I don’t know how he figured it out - but he did and he had Emily killed. The police found her body on the bench where your dad and her used to meet. When he called me, Leslie, I’ve never heard a man come undone before. I thought he was going to kill himself. And then the bombs went off the next day. We were alone and we did the best we could. We kept Grace safe. We kept ourselves safe so we could stop Nelson.”

Leslie really isn’t sure what to think or feel or say. She wrings her hands and stares out ahead of them at the darkened landscape. The sun has stared to rise and the light rims the horizon. For some reason she thinks of her mother, who lived her life improving schools in a small town in Indiana. How she misses Marlene right now. But even with her mother gone, Leslie doesn’t doubt what her mom would say.

“So, what do we do?” She looks at him and finally he looks back at her.

Grist smiles, “We’re going to find the evidence your sister died protecting. It’s somewhere in the ruins of D.C. and we’re going to find it and use it to overthrow Thomas Nelson. Your father is there and we’re going to go help him.”

“That’s why you needed Chris to hide Grace,” she says, “because you and my dad were going to make your move.”

Grist nods, “Your dad was a fool at Christmas. He went to Pawnee because he wanted to see you. He wanted to see you and Grace. I told him it was too dangerous. Nelson would find out and then he would put it together that his daughter was in Pawnee. But your father didn’t listen. Damned idiot. And I was right. Nelson is headed toward your little town so me and Chris got you and Grace out of there.”

The seatbelt bites into Leslie’s shoulder as she jerks forward, “But my friends!” She leans her hands on the dashboard. She thinks she might be sick.

“I can’t save the world, sweetheart.” Grist mutters.

“You’ve got to turn around. I’ve got to warn them. If I had known I would have never left.”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you.”

“Turn this truck around.”

“Not going to happen.”

For a moment she considers if she could over power Grist, grab the wheel and run them off the road, but where would that get her? She’s have a ruined vehicle, a broken ankle, and no idea where they were. She feels the cold creep of dread in her veins.

“You’re signing their death warrant,” she says.

“Have more faith in your friends, Leslie,” he says, “Nelson isn’t going to march in there with machine guns asking about a baby girl. He’ll be more circumspect than that. The best thing you can do for them is to stay away. It’s safest for them if you and Grace are gone and no one knows how to find you. Nelson won’t torture information out of people who don’t have it. Trust your friends to take care of themselves.”

“I don’t know what to do,” she whispers, “I can’t believe this is happening.”

“You came along because you know I’m right,” Grist says, “this doesn’t end until we stop Nelson.”

“How am I going to be any help to you? I never even met Emily; I didn’t know she existed until Chris showed up at the cabin. How would I know where she hid evidence?”

“You’re raising her daughter and you’re both Knopes’. In my book that counts for something.”

Leslie slumps back into her seat and tucks her elbows into her ribcage. She stares out the window at the burgeoning light. She notes the things they are passing: tree, sign, car, road, stream, and house. She chants them to herself like she would say them to Grace: tree, tree, tree. She’d started doing this right before Christmas - saying words over and over - trying to teach Grace about the world. Now, Leslie licks her lips and wills herself not to cry.

There is so much about the world she doesn’t know how to teach Grace; there are so many things without a discernible name. Like how she hates Grist. She hates him for his cynicism and narrow outlook. She hates how he can shrug away the fate of the people in Pawnee with pragmatic nonchalance. She hates that she is jealous that her father had risked so much just to stay in contact with Emily. She hates that Ben left without talking to her and that she can’t stay mad at him right now because all she has energy for is hope that he might have Grace. She hates that still -  _still_ \- her gut is telling her that she did the right thing. The place she is supposed to be is right here in this truck, hurtling away from Pawnee, away from Ben & Grace, and toward something unknown and uncertain.

She hates all of it and has no name for any of it.

So she repeats:  _tree, sign, car, road, stream, house_. She repeats them over and over as the sun spills into the valley and slowly, incomprehensibly, the names of those who she has lost _Mom, Andy_  slip into her litany. They slip in among the trees and the burning golden light until Leslie can’t hold back a tear and then a second. She hugs herself tighter and forces herself to think about them. They were so different, but both of them were brave. They looked at life and did not flinch. From them Leslie could remember to be brave.

_Tree, sign, car, road, stream, house, Mom, Andy…_

***

Here is something Ron does not know how to handle:  drunk Ann.

After Leslie leaves - disappears into the night with nothing but a note:  _I’m going to find Grace_  - Ann rails about her headstrong, steamroller of a best friend for two days. She stomps and yells and clenches her fists. And then she starts baking. She bakes in the outdoor stove Leslie and Ben fashioned in the fall when they lived in Leslie’s house. She bakes breads and goes down to City Hall and passes them out. She shoves a loaf into Joan Calamazzo’s hands every time she shows up at the house asking where Leslie went.

“She’s surveying the outer boundaries of Pawnee,” Ann says the first time Joan shows up. She hands the woman a loaf of cinnamon bread, shuts the door, and curses.

“She’s helping cut cords of wood.”

“She’s out harvesting corn.”

“She’s in the shower.”

“She’s joined a convent.”

The excuses get worse and worse - though the bread gets better and better (pumpkin, raisin, wheat, and chocolate chip).

“This is so like her, Ron,” Ann paces their bedroom. They’ve taken up residence in the room that used to belong to April and Andy. Ann carefully packed Andy’s belongings away in boxes and stored them in the basement next to Leslie’s tuba. Someday, she says, April will want them. “She gets these save-the-day ideas and then its up to the rest of us to fall into place. It’s selfish and unfair.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Don’t you go agreeing with me,” Ann spins, “Her daughter is missing. Ben took off on some Indiana Jones mission to find her and all she needs us to do is hold down the fort while she’s gone. I mean it is  _so like her_ ,” her shoulders slump, “but it’s Leslie so...”

“I’m really not sure what I’m supposed to say.”

“You’re supposed to find me alcohol.”

So Ron finds her terrible grain alcohol and Ann drinks it from a chipped  _Pawnee Parks_ mug she finds in Leslie’s cabinets. Her face squirms up in the most adorable way.

“This tastes like glue,” she hisses.

“You don’t have to drink it.”

“Yes I do,” Ann says, “Because my best friend is an idiot.”

“I really don’t understand what is going on right now.”

And when Ann is thoroughly drunk she sings. She croons into the end of Ron’s favorite hammer ( _not what that is supposed to be used for)_ and stands on the cushions of the couch. She sings musicals.

_So maybe its time, and maybe when I wake they’ll be there calling be baby…maybe…_

_Seventy six trombones…_

_I’m defying gravity…_

_Matchmaker, matchmaker make me a match, catch me a catch…_

On the last one she tips forward and if Ron didn’t leap up and catch her she would have face planted into the rug. She loops her arms around his neck and hangs on, singing lightly into his chest, “ _Bring me no ring, groom me no groom, find me no find, catch me no catch, unless he’s a matchless match.”_

Ron decides - with Ann in his arms - that it is good for a person to be placed in situations they cannot handle. It leads to the sweetest of revelations.

 

***  
  


_“Kiss me,” Leslie whispers as she rolls over him._

_Ben’s hands grip her hips and he pulls her close until  he wouldn’t have been able to know where he stopped and she started. The blankets shroud them and for once it is just him and Leslie. There is no world outside the two of them, him pressing his lips to hers and her winding her arms around his neck, fingers toying with the ends of his hair._

 

_“You need a hair cut,” she murmurs._

 

_“You like it long,” he presses her back into the mattress and slots himself between her legs, “You said it makes me look like a pirate.”_

 

_Leslie pulls back, “Didn’t most pirates have scurvy?”_

 

_“Scurvy is not sexy bedroom talk,” Ben follows her and catches her with a kiss._

 

_Leslie wiggles away, laughing, “I think Pirate Ben is perfect pillow talk. Would you have a parrot?”_

 

_“Stop.”_

 

_“You could name him Partridge,” she giggles._

 

_“I don’t get why this is funny to you.”_

 

_“And your ship could be called the Enterprise. I would be your first mate and we’d carry on a torrid love affair that we’d have to keep secret from the crew.”_

 

_“The Enterprise was a space ship. Not a pirate ship.”_

 

_“Or better yet I could be your arch nemesis! Ann and I would be privateers hired by some government to bring you to justice. Our ship would be called the Galentines. I would be torn between my attraction to your cute butt and my devotion to justice. It would make a spectacular adventure,” Leslie squirms. She is so pleased with her own idea._

 

_“Leslie.”_

 

_“Yeah?”_

 

_Ben tips up an eyebrow, “As much as I love your imagined adventures with Ann, I really just want to have sex with you right now.”_

 

_She smiles smugly, “Only if you talk like a pirate.”_

 

_“No.”_

 

_“Then no sex.”_

 

_He moves fast. He pins her hands above her head and presses her into the mattress, kissing her hard and long. When he pulls back, skimming her cheek with his nose, he can hear the little exhale she gives. He presses two quick kisses and on the last one he feels her smile beneath him._

 

_“Leslie, let me ravish ye,” he says. He tries something like a pirate accent, but his voice cracks in the middle._

 

_She laughs a full throated cackle. Ben can feel her stomach muscles contract beneath his and he loves that detail - that he can feel Leslie’s laughter all the way down to his gut._

 

_She slips her arms around his neck and pulls him back to her, “Yes. I want all sorts of adventures with you, Ben Wyatt.”_

 

“Ben!” April calling his name shakes Ben out of his day dream. Or memory. Really, it was a memory. It had happened.  
  
  
Once there had been a night where they laughed and made pillow talk about pirates. Ben licks his lips and clears his throat.

 

“Sorry,” he coughs.

 

“What’s your problem?” April rolls her eyes. She adjusts her pack and nods toward the apartment building they just finished combing through.

 

“Nothing.”

 

“Then what’s next?”

 

“What’s the next address on the list?”

 

April pulls out the sheet of paper on which Ben had written the addresses he could remember Grist had used in Indianapolis in the past. She holds the paper between two fingers and the paper crinkles in the wind.

 

“This was the last one,” she says, “what’s next?”

 

Ben rubs a hand over his face and sighs, “I don’t know.”

 

***

 

“So we’re just supposed to stay here until Zale gives us the all clear?” Chris says on the fourth day in the apartment.

 

“Something like that. We’re stocked up,” Mark shrugs, “Zale says we keep Grace safe while he exposes Nelson.”

 

“And then what?”

 

Mark tips back his beer, “Whadda mean then what?”

 

“What do we do after Nelson is out of power?”

 

“Go back to your life. I don’t know,” Mark says, “I’m just here to pay back the favor I owe Leslie. After that I’m heading west. I heard things are better out there. Less screwed up.”

 

Chris shifts a sleeping Grace in his arms. He gazes down at her perfectly content face, “I don’t have a life to go back to.”

 

“Sucks to be you.”

 

***

 

They arrive in New D.C., which lies in the shadow of what used to be Washington D.C., in the early grey hours of morning. There is a fog and Leslie has to squint to see through it. While the bombs left Pawnee a shell of its former self, Leslie had yet to see real destruction. What used to be rural farmland has become a sea of tents, ramshackle buildings, and the occasional camper parked in a field. Grist barreled past what Leslie quickly realized were settlements organized around highway exits.

 

“Where are we?”

 

“A little north of what used to be Prince William Forest Park. That’s where Nelson set up his new capitol after he seized control of Quantico. It gives him control of the waterways.”

 

“What about D.C.?”

 

“What about it?”

 

“Is there anything left?”

 

“Nope. Just a hole in the ground. Same goes for New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and a half dozen other cities.”

 

Even though it has been months since the bombs the full force of what happened hits her now. Those lives. They had been stopped short. One moment they were worried about the meeting next week and getting dinner on the table and whether they’d ever fall in love again and a dozen other daily, human things that seem mundane until they are gone. Once they are gone, impossible to retrieve, then those mundane things become the sweetest of things.

 

Leslie doesn’t cry. She is tired of crying. She is tired. Instead, she stares at the road ahead of them and the newly painted sign that announces their arrival in New D.C..

 

“Bet your glad you’re from a small town now,” Grist muses.

 

Leslie says nothing. There is nothing to say.

 

***

 

Ron is at City Hall when the soldiers come. Deputy Carl comes running into what used to be the City Council chambers. Now it is the central hub for the Pawnee government. Howser and Joan confer around the heavy oak conference table. With spring on its way, the town is beginning to organize the growing of crops. Ron spies Leslie’s binders spread out on the table as Howser and Joan hover over them taking notes. Even when she is gone, Ron muses, Leslie is still running the show.

 

Deputy Carl is out of breath, bent over at the waist, heaving, “THEY’RE HERE!”

 

“Who is here?”

 

“Soldiers. The army. Outside City hall right now. They’re here to rescue us.”

 

There is a rush of people as everyone pushes outside to see for themselves. Ron hangs back. Rescue them? Rescue them from what?

 

Outside in the weak winter sunlight the street is full of soldiers standing at attention. In their midst is a line of heavily fortified trucks. Ron stays on the edge of the crowd. He pulls his coat tight across his chest and fights the urge to run home, grab Ann, and escape back to his cabin. They had had a good life there, but in the wake of Andy’s death everything changed. Ron couldn’t hide in the woods any more.

 

From the first jeep, a man in uniform steps out. Soldiers form a brigade around him. He strides with the easy gait of someone in charge. Ron watches Joan and Howser push forward as the man takes the City Hall steps two at a time.

 

“Welcome to Pawnee,” Joan extends her hand and for a second Ron remembers that she used to have a television show. How far away that all seems now. “I’m Joan Calamezzo.”

 

The man - a full head of brown hair and shocking blue eyes - smiles, “I’m Thomas Nelson. Your president.”

 

***

 

They spend their nights in a hollowed out storefront. Everything has been picked over so it is a strange graveyard of shelves and posters advertising soda and the upcoming Tina Fey movie. April stares at the poster every time they come back to the storefront from a day searching for Grace. Andy had loved Tina Fey. She’s one smart lady, he used to say, just like you April.

 

It is too dangerous to build a fire or turn on a flashlight, Ben says. At night looters emerge like rats to search the city. They eat peanut butter from a jar as the sun sets between the buildings and once it is dark neither of them talk. They take turns sitting up while the other sleeps.

 

When it is her turn to sleep April burrows into her sleeping bag. She pulls it up over her head and in the dark, warm space of the nylon blanket she pretends she is waiting for Andy in their bed back at Leslie’s house. Or in the pillow fort they used to build in the living room. She hugs a sweatshirt to her chest and pretends it is Grace. She misses the way Andy used to hold Grace in the crook of his arm like a football. She was so small and he was so large. There are a lot of things April misses about Andy, but the one she doesn’t expect - the one that hits her the hardest - is his largeness. She misses fitting against his rib cage, feeling his hands on her back, and the way she could tuck her head into his neck. It seems like suck an intimate thing to miss - the expansiveness of his warm, _alive_  body. The only time she lets herself miss Andy is in the moments before slumber, alone in her sleeping bag, with the world shut out.

 

The rest of the time - when she is picking through abandoned apartments with Ben and taking a shift keeping watch while he sleeps - April thinks of Chris. She thinks of the knife strapped to her belt and where she would stick it first. She lets her imagination go wild, pictures it over and over, until she doesn’t feel sick each time she thinks about it.

 

She ticks off the major arteries in her head. Debates if it should be fast or slow. It is only when Andy leaks in that she considers making it fast and painless. He would want her to do it that way.  _Babe_ , he’d say. But if April was honest with herself (which she doesn’t want to be) she knows Andy would  _never_ want her to do this. Andy would never kill someone like this.

 

But April isn’t Andy.

 

***

 

Leslie doesn’t know what she thought they were going to do. Storm Nelson’s office? Did he even have an office? She really had no idea how to conceive of this world. She thought things had changed in Pawnee. But in Pawnee the worst they had to deal with was some looting and Sewage Joe and the black market. When they get to New D.C. and Leslie sees the massive operation it is she suddenly feels very small.

 

Grist parks the car in a lot of abandoned cars. He smashes in the rear cabin window and when Leslie flinches he shrugs, “No one will think to try it. They’ll assume it’ll work. Trust me you’ll be happy with a broken window if it means this thing is here when you need to make a quick getaway.”

 

She doesn’t say anything, but shifts her pack and leans on her crutches. Grist talks as they hobble toward the center of New D.C.. He points out the hodgepodge neighborhoods that have built up in what used to be subdivisions. There that street is filled with engineers and that one over there is mainly filled with stablemen.

 

“Animal husbandry is a revived art now,” Grist says. He walks alongside Leslie with his own limp. Leslie remembers what Ben said about Grist. He’d received a bullet to the left leg in some overseas mission. Leslie wonders if it had included her father, but she pushes that thought away. She doesn’t want to think about her father.

 

“Why?”

 

Grist shrugs, “Horses don’t need gas.”

 

It takes them till mid-afternoon to reach the city market. Semi-permanent tents are set up along what used to be a country highway. Salesman shout their wares:  pineapple, guns, wool jackets, and even a man selling what he claimed were nuclear-detection devices.

 

“Wear it around your neck,” he shouts, “and it’ll sound when radiation levels get deadly. It’ll save your life twice over it will!”

 

It is another fact that hits Leslie. Pawnee had been far enough from the bombs that after the fall out rain it never occurred to them to worry about radiation. As mayor she made sure they tested the water supply once a month, but otherwise the bombs were a distant memory.

 

She realizes that if you are trying to hide a baby hiding her in the middle of no where really was the best strategy. She feels a moment of admiration toward her father and Grist, but pushes it away.

 

“Are we almost there?” she huffs after an hour wandering the market. Her broken ankle was swollen and her arms ached from the crutches. Her body was weary from being scrunched up in that truck for 24 hours and sweat ran down her back despite the fact it was February.

 

Grist - who had been examining a wheel of cheese - looks at her over his shoulder, “You finally ready?”

 

“You’ve been waiting on me this whole time?”

 

“Listen, if you don’t have major issues toward your father for all this maneuvering then you’re an idiot,” Grist popped a sliver of the cheese in his mouth. His hair stood up in tufts and he had bulbous eyes that gave him the appearance of a raving lunatic. He smacked his lips, “I wasn’t going to take him to you until you were damned ready.”

 

She knocks at his feet with her crutches, “Let’s go Freud.”

 

Grist laughs.

 

***

 

Ron waits until Joan and Howser escort Nelson to City Hall before he takes off for home. He forces himself to slow down and act calm. Never have a few miles seemed like an eternity to Ron. He doesn’t know who to believe, but Chris had talked about a Thomas Nelson. He’d named  _him_  the enemy and Leslie had been foolish or smart enough to believe him and Grist. And the fact was Ron hated the government and he really hated a government that survived a nuclear war. Damned roaches the lot of them.

 

“Ron,” Ann meets him at the front door. The house smells like bread. She is still baking and it turns something in his heart, the smells of home even now. She grips his shirt and his arms find her waist, “Tom and Donna just got here with Jerry. They said there are soldiers.”

 

Inside is the rest of the Parks crew and Ron shudders a bit when he realizes that they are looking at him for direction. It was always Leslie who did this sort of thing. Damn her for leaving.

 

“It’s not just the army. It’s  _President_ Thomas Nelson _.”_

 

“I don’t remember voting,” Donna snorts.

 

“Whatever we live in now its not the United States we’re used too.” Ron recounts the arrival of Nelson and his army.

 

“What do you think they want?”

 

“If Chris is to be believed, he’s looking for Grace,” Ann settles onto the arm of the couch.

 

“But Chris killed Andy,” Tom argues.

 

“It might have been an accident,” Ann says, “It’s hard to plan on someone going through a windshield.”

 

“But he took Grace,” Tom shakes his head, “dude is not to be trusted.”

 

“But that’s the thing…,” Ann stands up, “He always said he was here to help keep Grace safe. And less than a week after he takes her Thomas Nelson shows up in Pawnee with an line of tanks and guys with guns? What are the odds they aren’t related?”

 

“How do we know Thomas Nelson is the bad guy?” Jerry offers, “All we’ve got it Chris’ word and he’s going on what this Grist guy told him. How can we trust any of it?”

 

“We can’t,” Ron says, “but Leslie did. She trusted her gut enough to go with Grist.”

 

“Girl isn’t in her right mind,” Donna mutters, “Blames herself for Andy.”

 

“But she’s kept us alive,” Ann crosses her arms, “she’s kept Pawnee alive. If I had to bet on anyone’s gut it would be Leslie Knope’s. What about you?” She looks at Ron.

 

“I don’t think it’s a matter of trust,” Ron says, “We all owe Leslie Knope. This is a matter of loyalty,” he looks each of them in the eye. Ron wasn’t one for speeches and he isn’t about to start now so he keeps it short and simple, “This is our family now. We’ve all lost people and we’ve got to be there for each other. Besides, there is no reason for this man to be in Pawnee unless he is looking for Grace and Leslie. It doesn’t mean I trust Chris, but I don’t trust this guy either.”

 

Ann squeezes his hand. They look at Donna and Jerry and Tom. Ron realizes that each of them is free to make their own decisions and in a world as precarious as this one he wouldn’t blame them. Hadn’t that been what he and Ann did for all those months at the cabin - survive and hunker down? It was a perfectly reasonable choice. Ron is still Ron, but he is learning - slowly - that to live as an autonomous individual is a lonely existence.

 

Donna glances between Tom and Jerry before giving Ron an affirmative nod, “Okay what are we going to do?”

 

“I have an idea,” Ron says, “but it requires burning down Leslie’s house.”

 

***

 

“I’m such an idiot,” Ben stops in the middle of the street. Their fifth day in Indianapolis and they’ve taken to just wandering. Neither knows where to look next.

 

“We already knew that.” April deadpans.

 

“I’ve been thinking of this as all Grist’s plan,” Ben stammers, “but it isn’t. Why would he bring Grace all the way to Pawnee the day before the bombs? Why would he come back with Chris and distract me the day Jean-Ralphio died? Why send Chris to the cabin to take Grace?”

 

“I don’t know…why?”

 

“Because he isn’t the one calling the shots. It’s Zale.”

 

“What’s the difference?”

 

“It means that Zale is the one who sent Chris and probably is the one who arranged a place for him to stay in Indianapolis.”

 

“We don’t even know if they’re here.”

 

“They’re here.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

“What is super secret agent rule number one?” Ben turns in a circle in the street as if he expected someone to pop out from behind a building at any moment.

 

“Always know you’re surroundings.”

 

“Exactly. Chris and I spent years in the Indianapolis field office. Zale spent years working out of the same office. The CIA contracted some of our space. Seriously, how did I not realize this?” he tugs on the ends of his hair.

 

“I don’t get it.”

 

“Zale and Chris would want to hide Grace somewhere they’re familiar with. The FBI field office kept a series of apartments in their building. They were just temporary quarters, but they’re secure.”

 

“You think that’s where Chris is?”

 

Ben grins, “That’s exactly where he is.”

 

 

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

Leslie falls onto her bunk exhausted and rubs her ankle.

 

 

She still has to wrap it when she goes out on search missions, but in the six weeks that she has been in New D.C. the bones have knit back together and it is only at night that she feels the echo of pain.

 

She is glad when the pain comes back. It is good for her. The pain reminds her of Andy and how her ankle broke in the first place. The pain makes her angry. She falls asleep with anger tickling the back of her throat and when she wakes up it is still there. It is the anger that gets her through the day. It acts like a stop gap for all the other emotions bunched up in her chest:  the fear, guilt, and weariness. Instead of feeling them she focuses on the anger. It gets her through each day.

 

“Knope, you going up for dinner?”

 

It is Marta, her bunk mate. The woman snores, but otherwise she is capable and quiet. She is in her early fifties with thick curly brown hair. She lost two teenage daughters and a husband in the bombs. Not that Marta told her that. Grist had. Marta - really most people Leslie has met in New D.C. - doesn’t talk about her life before the bombs.

 

For everyone the story is the same. It is a list of dead loved ones, lost homes, and lives that evaporated like the mist in the mornings off the fields. Sometimes when she dreams of Ben and Grace, Leslie goes out to the field behind her father’s bar as the sun rise between the trees. She watches the billows of her breath in the cold, spring air and stands perfectly still.

 

The mist plumes off the grass and the only sounds are birds calling out and an occasional cow bellowing from the far paddock. In those moments she lets herself think of Ben, his wide hands on her shoulders and back, anchoring her. In those moments she lets herself wonder how much her baby has changed in the past six weeks. What words had she learned? Did she still have that curl that falls across her forehead right after a bath? Did she miss Leslie?

 

“Knope, food?” Marta shook Leslie’s shoulder.

 

“Oh, yeah.” Leslie rises and follows Marta out of the narrow basement bedroom they shared with four other women who joined her father’s cause. The men slept in a room on the other side of the basement. She falls behind Marta on the narrow staircase and watches her feet on the steps. She wonders if maybe she can sneak away after dinner and go down to the bathhouse. She is tired and dirty from the day’s work.

 

Her father doesn’t like the idea of Leslie wandering anywhere without him or Grist. It’s why Grist is her partner whenever it is her turn to go out to the ruins of D.C. to search for the evidence her sister Emily left them. The evidence that connected Tommy Nelson to the bombs. It is that mythical evidence that would convince the military to stop following Nelson’s every order. To rise up and over throw him.

 

“Did you finish going through the office building?” Marta asks at the top of the stairs. They stand alone on the landing.

 

On the other side of the door is her father’s bar. It is the front of his operation. He runs the biggest, loudest bar in New D.C.. Every military officer comes through that bar at least once a week. They come because Brad Zale has the best stock. They come because Zale never lets anyone bother them, beg them for a job or food or news on a long lost loved one. They also come for the women. It is the part that Leslie prefers not to think about, but the real money maker is the women who live above the bar and the services they provide to whichever military officers have the money to pay up.

 

“How do you think we know about patrol schedules? Weapon stocks?” Grist sneered when they first arrived at her father’s bar. Leslie had stormed out when she discovered women selling their bodies under her father’s name.

 

“I won’t be part of this.” She shouted at both men. They sat in her father’s office. Grist was red faced at Leslie’s indignation, but her father’s expression had not changed. He was as stone faced as he had been when Grist brought her to him.

 

“Leslie, every single of those women chose their position.” Zale said, “No one is forcing them. They consider what they are doing to be patriotic even. They believe in our cause.”

 

“And what is that?”

 

“To bring Tommy Nelson to justice for the deaths of millions. To take back our future and the future of this country from a madmen.”

 

“I don’t get how women becoming prostitutes ushers in a new wave of democracy.”

 

“Because this isn’t some history you read in a text book or watched on PBS special. This is real life and the fact is men talk,” Zale said. “They pull bodies out of rubble and watch children go hungry so they want someone warm to confess things to. They want to be comforted because they are foolish enough to mistake sex for love. And we use that to our advantage. We’d be insane not too.”

 

“There has to be another way.”

 

“There is no other way.” Grist muttered.

 

Zale stood. “You chose to come here,” he said. “This is our way. Either accept that or go home.”

 

And Leslie had - over the weeks - learned to accept it. It was never palatable. She tried befriending the women, but she is Zale’s daughter. To them she is some sort of interloper into the world her father had built up. She was from a far away town where people worked together to grow food and people respected property. Here in New D.C., Pawnee might as well be a fairy tale.

 

Marta nudges Leslie’s arm, “The office building? Did you finish?”

 

“Oh, yeah. We did. Another one to check off.” She forces herself to smile a bit.

 

“What’s next on the list?”

 

“Uh, I think her apartment. Or what’s left of it.”

 

“Makes you wonder if the evidence could have survived the blast.”

 

“My father seems sure it did. He said Emily told him it could.”

 

“Well,” Marta muses, “that’s a lot stock to put in the word of a dead girl.”

 

“That dead girl is my sister.”

 

“They’re all somebody’s sister, sweet heart.” Marta snorts before pushing open the door and the noise of the bar fills Leslie’s ears.

 

***

 

 

Ron isn’t a leader. Hell, he can barely stand people. Really it is Ann who does the heavy lifting of recruiting and organizing people. It is just like the cabin all over again except this time it is all of Pawnee. This is our home, she tells Tonya, the salad lady, and Carl the Deputy and the other half dozen citizens she’s managed to bring over to the cause over the last six weeks.

 

Pawnee is our home and they’ve taken over our home, she says. How is that a rescue? Feels more like an occupation.

 

After Nelson showed up with his troops the military restored Pawnee’s connection to the sporadic power grid so that there was power even if it was severely rationed. They restocked the hospital and put an end to the looting from Eagleton. And for the first few weeks everyone rejoiced. Something like normalcy was returning to Pawnee.

 

But then came the home searches. Nelson led his men house by house through the town looking for something. He never told people what it was, though the Parks crew knew they were looking for Leslie and Grace. They know because they watched Nelson go crazy on the front lawn of Leslie’s house the night they burned it down. He shot bullets into the smoldering husk of the house and screamed for his soldiers to turn the town upside down.

 

“I don’t care if you have to kill people in the streets,” Nelson screamed, “eventually this town will give her up.”

 

That night Ron and company disappeared. They move every few nights. They hide out in the ranger cabins in the far flung Pawnee parks and then in Ann’s abandoned house and finally they retreat to Ron’s cabin to restock supplies before returning to town. They split into groups and slept in tents. They wait till night to come out and avoid being seen by anyone.

 

They sneak onto the 4th floor of City Hall to destroy the water logged records. The paper history of Pawnee births, marriages, and deaths curled in the fire until they were nothing but ash and smoke. Whatever information about Leslie they could keep from Nelson was one more layer of protection. One less way for him to track her or Grace down. They do the same to Marlene’s house and Leslie’s office at City Hall. When her office catches fire Nelson figures out there are saboteurs working against him and it doesn’t take long for him to interview enough townspeople to make a list of Leslie Knope’s loyal friends. Nelson’s soldiers print flyers with their faces on them and hand them out to people at the farmer’s market.

 

“These dissidents are wanted criminals,” the soldiers tell scared citizens. “They are trying to ruin the peace we’re here to protect. If you see them alert authorities.”

 

Ben and April are on that list too, but no one in town has seen them since Christmas. The town tells Nelson they are likely dead along with Andy Dwyer. Among the Parks department crew no one talks about Ben and April even when it is just the five of them. They don’t talk about Leslie or Grace. If they don’t talk about it, they can each go on believing that their friends are alive and safe.

 

Stymying Nelson’s search for Leslie isn’t their only goal. Over the weeks more soldiers flow into Pawnee. Nelson gives a speech on the steps of City Hall about how Pawnee is going to be the new capitol of Indiana. Joan and Howser flank his sides and the town cheers as Nelson promises the town will rise again.

 

But quietly, slowly citizens have been turned out of their homes so soldiers can have a place to sleep. The food from the community farms Leslie helped organize last fall have been taken over by the military under the guise of better management. The government Leslie helped shape, the one that was of the people for the people, slowly becomes nothing more than a puppet for Nelson.

 

And quietly, they take advantage of people’s unrest because there is nothing Pawnee dislikes more than people coming into their town and telling them how to run it. They help find new homes for the people turned out by soldiers. They organize hunting parties since there is almost no meat left for people to trade for at the farmer’s market. Ann makes rounds to people who can’t go to the hospital now that Nelson and his men have taken it over. You only receive treatment if you have information or favor to trade on. Tom becomes a black market fiend, practically making a business out of being the guy who knows who has what to trade. Each time they help someone it endears the town to their cause. Not everyone wants to sign on the dotted line for an open rebellion, but over time Ron can tell they are gathering up a thousand tiny favors that someday will become important. A thousand brave acts might be enough, he tells Ann late at night when she curls up against his side.

 

“I told you not every person is dumb,” she whispers sleepily. “They’ll surprise you most of the time.”

 

***

 

“You look lonely,” the man pulls himself onto the stool next to Leslie. She keeps staring at the bowl of stew she had been eating when he invited himself next to her at the bar.

 

At the other end of the bar she can see Grist flick his gaze toward them, but she doesn’t meet his eye. She doesn’t need his help.

 

“You look lost,” she tells the guy. His breath smells and she can tell he is drunk. He wears the uniform of the Nelson militia, the crisp tan jacket and pants.

 

“And I bet you’d be happy to find my way,” under the bar the man strokes Leslie’s thigh. She doesn’t jump. She doesn’t want Grist or Zale to interfere. If they do she’ll never get to the bathhouse tonight and she so desperately wants to soak the dust and destruction out of her skin.

 

“If you want a girl like that look upstairs.”

 

“I want you. I like the girl next door look. It reminds me of the good old days when girls were fresh faced. I bet you are great from all sorts of positions.”

 

“Not going to happen.”

 

“Come on, I bet its been forever. You’ve got broken heart written all over you,” he curls his hand higher, “Did you lose him in the bombs or the fallout?”

 

Leslie bows her head. She grips the fork tight in her fist. She thinks of Ben and imagines what he’d do to the guy if he were now. He is smaller than this guy, but Ben is fast and exact. She can imagine at least three different ways he would have laid the guy out across the bar by now.

 

But Leslie isn’t Ben. She doesn’t have the training he does. What she has is anger and anger gets you a long way. Under the bar the man’s hand is practically between her legs now and when he gets there Leslie lets her arm fly down with as much force as she can muster. She stabs the fork right through the muscle between his thumb and forefinger. She doesn’t stop until she feels the tines hit the wood of the bar. She pins him there and backs away as he squirms and screams.

 

“You crazy bitch!” the man howls. He pulls the fork and his hand free. It’s a superficial wound, but Leslie knows it hurts like a fucker. He comes at her, but she is ready. She sidesteps him and delivers a swift kick to the back of his legs. This brings him buckling to the floor and gives her the upper hand. She wraps an arm tight against his throat. She stands behind him and pulls the gun she keeps tucked into the back of her jeans. She holds it against his temple and pulls his head tight into the vee of her chest.

 

“Is this the position you had in mind?” She whispers into his ear.

 

The whole bar stares at them. Out of her periphery she sees Grist launch himself over the bar. He holds a gun up to several soldiers who have drawn their guns in aid of their comrade. The bar quiets and Leslie hears her father’s boots on the floor.

 

“Put your guns away. I’m not having a blood bath. Not in my bar,” Zale’s voice commands the room. He emerges from his office behind the bar and Leslie can hear the annoyance in his voice.

 

“Call your bitch daughter off,” the man squirms in Leslie’s grip. She brings a foot down on his ankle and takes too much pleasure when he howls again.

 

Zale tips an eyebrow and approaches the man, “I figure she probably had a good reason to kick your ass. Especially seeing that there are plenty of willing ladies upstairs.” He looks at Leslie, “You alright?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Then let him go. You’ve made your point.” He tells Leslie. Zale jerks the man by the chin, “Just to show you how forgiving I can be the next round is on me.” He holds his arms up to the whole bar. There are cheers and people begin to turn back to their own conversations, clearly uninterested unless someone was actually going to get shot.

 

Leslie is tempted. She is tempted to put a bullet through the man’s foot or maybe even point her gun at the jute box crooning Journey in the far corner. Just to make the point that she can. That her father may control the world inside this bar, but he doesn’t control her.

 

But she doesn’t because she can hear Ben in her head. The best way to survive is to not do something stupid. Don’t let emotions cloud your choices. It’s the first thing he taught her all those months ago. So she lets her wrist go limp, the gun fall by her side, and she steps away from her father, the man, and the bar. She pushes past Grist and Marta and flees out the back of the bar. She runs until she is in the middle of the field, surrounded by fireflies blinking in the night. Even though her father’s bar is just off the main thoroughfare of New D.C. she only has to run a hundred yards to be completely alone.

 

She sits down in the tall grass and drops her head to her knees. She gives in and lets herself think of the one thing she never dares think about. She lets herself think about Ben.

 

***

 

_“What do you think she’ll grow up to be? Grace?” Leslie asks._

 

_Ben looks up from the book he is reading. It is a lazy Saturday afternoon. The baby is asleep in her pack n’ play in the corner of the room and the two of them are on the couch reading. Her feet are in his lap and he rubs the bridge of her foot absently. She looks up from her biography to study the way his hair never seems to stand down. It has a life of its own._

 

_She studies Ben’s profile - from his beard to the slope of his shoulders down to the nail on his thumb. She just looks at him. There is wanting him and appreciating him and needing him, but it occurs to her that there is also looking. To study and memorize and see him from all the angles and in all the contexts life would put them in. She didn’t spend nearly enough time just looking at Ben Wyatt. She wanted more - all - the time with him._

 

_For whatever reason that causes her to think of the future and Grace and them as a family so she asks the question._

 

_Ben looks up from his book, “You mean like what kind of job will she have?”_

 

_“I guess,” Leslie sits up, “though can you even have a career in a world like this?”_

 

_“I hope that by the time she’s old enough to think about the world will have started to put itself back together.”_

 

_“We could go to Belize. I bet people still have careers in Belize.”_

 

_Ben puts his book down, “Does it ever occur to you to just leave?”_

 

_“Like leave Pawnee?”_

 

_“Leave the United States. I mean the bombs didn’t hit everywhere in the world. Surely life is normal in like Canada.”_

 

_Leslie wrinkles her nose, “Why would I want to live in Canada?”_

 

_“You know what I’m talking about.”_

 

_She shrugs, “No. Not really. Pawnee. The United States. It’s home. I don’t want to give up on home.”_

 

_“But even if it means giving up on your dreams? It’s not like you’re going to be elected the President. There is no United States left to run.”_

 

_Leslie looks at Grace’s sleeping form. “I would go anywhere or do anything I would do it for her. For you. For our friends. That’s my dream now. That the people I care about are happy and safe.”_

 

_“Grace isn’t safe.”_

 

_“I know. That’s why we can’t stop until she is.”_

 

_“So someday she can grow up and move to Belize if she wants,” Ben interlaces his fingers through hers._

 

_Leslie squeezes his hand. “So she can swim with whale sharks and be happy.”_

 

***

 

It is stupid really - Ron knows that - but a man in love does stupid things sometimes. He remembers watching Ben fall in love with Leslie. It had been so evident and it is so evident to him now that he is in the exact same spot.

 

He kisses Ann on the forehead before he goes. He says he is going to do some hunting. He misses being out in the woods alone. He’ll be gone an hour, two at the most.

 

But instead of slipping into Ramset Park, which has the best raccoon if you can hunt one down, Ron slips into Ann’s old neighborhood. Ever since those flyers have gone around it is impossible for them to return to Ann’s house. He is sure Nelson is having it watched. This is why the whole thing is stupid, but see he knows she misses it. She misses the scrapbook Leslie made for her Galentine’s Day last year. It is a tiny thing, but she keeps talking about it. At night she wonders aloud to Ron if Leslie is still alive and she always brings up the scrapbook.

 

“She is my best friend,” Ann says, “She’s the best person I know.”

 

He tries to kiss the worry out of her, but it doesn’t work. So now he is going for the scrapbook because Ron loves Ann. He is in love with Ann and he can’t bring Leslie back so he will bring her the scrapbook. It is stupid, but he is a man in love.

 

Which is why he misses the lookout waiting for him inside the house. He takes down two of Nelson’s men at the back door, but he barrels inside without thought. He is so happy he wasn’t shot dead that he doesn’t even see the gun pointed at him until the metal presses against his side.

 

“Don’t move,” the guard breathes.

 

“You don’t want to do this son,” Ron holds up his hands.

 

“Shut up!”

 

“You can let me walk out of here and we’ll pretend this never happened.”

 

“I already radioed in. They’re on their way. We’re just going to sit down and wait.”

 

And that is the man’s mistake. He lets Ron sit down on the couch while he stands over him with the gun pointed at Ron’s head. He keeps talking, babbling about duty and orders and the bombs. He is young. Ron didn’t get a good look at him, but he imagines the kid isn’t more than a teenager. He probably did Scouts. He probably played basketball. If only there hadn’t been bombs. Maybe Ron could have shown him the Swanson Pyramid of Greatness and the kid wouldn’t have ended up in Nelson’s militia.

 

But somewhere in his talking, the kid bends down to make his point. For a second the gun is aimed down at the couch and not at Ron and in that split second Ron moves. He barrels forward, running himself into the kid’s stomach, and they go tumbling gracelessly to the floor. There is a struggle but it is never a fair one. The gun skitters under the coffee table and it is just the two of them fighting for dominance. The kid gets in a punch to the gut, but Swanson’s learn how to wrestle before they can walk. He knocks the kid out and staggers to his feet.

 

For a brief second, Ron thinks he might have gotten away with it, but then headlights cut through Ann’s curtains. The front door is knocked in and soldiers flood the house. Ron holds his hands up and curses his own stupidity. If he hadn’t been so stupid then Ann wouldn’t about to end up alone.

 

“So this is the great Ron Swanson,” a voice drawls. It is Nelson. He walks in through the battered down door,  glass crunching under his boots. He surveys the unconscious soldier and Ron’s bloody lip. “You took down three boys half your age.”

 

“I’m Ron Fucking Swanson,” he says quietly.

 

Nelson snorts and pulls a gun from his belt. Ron closes his eyes because god help him he wants Ann’s face to be the last thing he remembers. He hears the gun cock and thinks about Ann, the freckles on her nose and the softness of her skin. She will be the last thing he thinks of. No one can take that from him.

 

A bang and Ron exhales.

 

He opens his eyes. He gasps. Nelson stands over the body of the soldier Ron knocked unconscious. There is a pool of blood around his head.

 

“Why….why did you do that?” Ron breathes.

 

“I call it motivation.” Nelson says. “Now people will know if they fail the price will be their life.”

 

Nelson stalks out of the house and the men holding Ron grab onto him. They usher him into a jeep behind Nelson’s and Ron doesn’t know what to think. He just keeps seeing the kid bleeding out on the floor of Ann’s house. All over a tiny token of friendship, a scrapbook. The senselessness of it renders Ron stupid.

 

***

 

The morning after her fight in the bar, Grist wakes Leslie up by throwing her pack at her.

 

“Let’s go,” he mumbles and stalks away.

 

She wasn’t scheduled to go out and search today. In addition to the bar, Zale runs a salvage operation. Nelson’s government issues permits to salvage companies to go through the hundreds of miles of debris around D.C.. They took their own risk of radiation exposure, but they could keep whatever they found as long as they cleared the land. The idea was that someday someone might be able to return to those places and start anew. Under the pretense of a business, Zale snared permits for the areas around D.C. where Emily might have hidden the evidence.

 

“Where are we going?” Leslie asks as she climbs into the truck with Grist.

 

“I thought it best if you kept a wide berth from your father today so I got us on the schedule.”

 

“My business with my father is not your concern.”

 

“He made it my concern when he sent me to Pawnee with that baby. When he convinced me to give up my career and go on the run.”

 

Leslie looks at Grist. She doesn’t understand him. She licks her lips, “Why are you so loyal to him?”

 

Grist points to his left leg. She remembers Ben telling her that was the leg with the bullet in it. It was how Ben got away when Grist faced him in Pawnee last winter. On bad days, Grist still limps on that leg.

 

“He shot you in the leg?”

 

“Yeah. We were undercover. It was a year-long operation and the guys we were after figured me out. They ordered your father to kill me. They were testing his loyalties and if he didn’t they were going to shoot him. The odds were ten to one.”

 

“And he shot you?”

 

“In the leg. He made a call, took a risk, and it saved my life. It surprised everyone and gave him enough time to take out a couple of the guys before they opened fire. He dragged my ass behind a car and had a shoot out with the Russian mob. All over my stinking self. I still don’t know how we managed to get out of there, but we did. Both of us when he could have left me for dead.”

 

“That is insane.”

 

“He said he went with his gut. There was no way of knowing if it would work, but he trusted his gut.”

 

Leslie thinks of Andy and the call she made to trust Chris. To bring Chris in. She thinks of the veto she used to override Ben’s opinion. All of that had been made on her gut. Even her choice to go with Grist to D.C. was based on her gut. It wasn’t how Ben would have done it. He was rational. He was careful and cautious. It made him a great agent. It made him a great partner. It made him Ben. But Leslie isn’t Ben. All she has is her gut. Her gut turns her into a fool rushing in. Andy said trust is a choice and she doesn’t regret her choice. She is proud that she chose to trust Chris. It takes a fool, she thinks, to hope people can change.

 

“Yeah, well I guess in some twisted way that makes sense.” She doesn’t look at Grist when she says it.

 

She grips the car door and looks at the broken landscape around them. She thinks of Andy and lets herself feel the heavy weight of guilt. She had been a fool, but she isn’t sure of any other way to be.

 

***

 

Nelson takes Ron to a windowless storage room on the 4th floor. Ron laughs, short and caustic, when they get to the top of the stairs. The hell of the 4th floor remains even in the wake of a nuclear war.

 

They strip him down and tie him to a cold metal chair. Nelson isn’t there, but Ron knows he is nearby. They leave him alone, cold, in the dark for a long time. The circulation in his hands and feet stops and he goes numb everywhere. At some point he passes out.

 

And then the door opens and there is a sliver of light. A solider comes in and Ron knows it isn’t Nelson. A weak man like Nelson does the dirty work himself.

 

There are questions. Questions about Leslie and Grace. Where was she? Who was she with?

 

Each question is punctuated by a punch to the face. At some point his left eye swells shut.

 

The soldier threatens Ann. He tells Ron they have her in the next room, but Ron knows better than that. Ann is smarter, braver, than all of them. She would survive. She would stay a step ahead of Nelson. She wasn’t stupid like all the men around her.

 

They soak him. Over and over again they push him into a barrel of water until he is waterlogged. He can’t recognize up from down, loud from soft, pain from peace. But still he doesn’t talk. He holds onto the image of Ann’s fingertips across his skin. He reminds himself over and over again that there is a woman out there who will smooth her hands across his brow. She will kiss him and punch him in the shoulder for being such an idiot. She will love him. Nelson can’t take that away from him.

 

At some point they stop and Ron sleeps, tied to the chair. He sleeps because he knows tomorrow they will start again.

 

***

 

After her fight in the bar, Marta and the rest of the people in her father’s employ keep a wide berth. Only Grist dares get near her. In the evenings he throws a plate of food down in front of her and they eat in companionable silence. It makes Leslie’s heart ache a little bit. She isn’t used to being the one no one likes. She isn’t used to this version of herself. She misses the old Leslie. The Leslie from before the bombs. That Leslie had been like sunshine. Now being her is more complicated.

 

When it is just the two of them, Grist talks to her about her father. She only grunts and picks through concrete. She uses the metal detector and kicks broken glass out of her way. She checks off each search grid on the clipboard and moves onto the next. It’s like searching for a needle in a haystack, she thinks. A haystack the size of a city block. Grist tells her stories from their spy days overseas. She never pegged him for the chatty sort, but he fills the space with words.

 

And finally one day Leslie actually listens. She listens to one story of a mission in Berlin, but it feels like she is listening to a movie. Whatever life her father had it wasn’t one she recognized.

 

“Tell me about Emily,” she says.

 

This catches Grist off guard. He straightens. “Emily?”

 

“She was my sister. She is Grace’s biological mother. Tell me about her.”

 

“Your father loved her very much.”

 

“I get that since he was foolish enough to keep going back to her even when he was a wanted man.”

 

“She was alone.”

 

“So was I.”

 

Her cheeks burn at the admission. Grist leans against a half crumbled wall. He sighs.

 

“You weren’t alone, Leslie. You had your mother. You had Pawnee.”

 

“He was my father.”

 

“And leaving you nearly killed him, but it's what your mother wanted.”

 

“What?”

 

Grist swears. He rubs his jaw, “You really should talk to him about this.”

 

“No. You tell me. Now,” she shouts, “Are you saying my mother knew?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“You’re lying. He’s lying. She would never lie to me like that.”

 

“Leslie I sat in their living room when she threw him out. You were three. I remember you got up and asked for a glass of milk. You mom put you back to bed and came out to the living room. She told him she didn’t want that sort of life for you. She didn’t trust him. She wanted him gone. I think your father considered it the last gift he could give you - a quiet life in a small town with a strong mother. Straight forward and good. Men like me and your father aren’t straight forward or good.”

 

She thinks of Ben. How often her heart curves back to Ben. Ben. Men like her father and Grist and Ben aren’t straight forward or good. She thinks back to those months they spent pretending. The months when she didn’t trust him. But see the difference is that he didn’t leave her. Her father left. Instead of fight for her, he had given in and built another life, created a new family.

 

And then like that the pieces fall into place for her:

 

 _One:_ Grist had said her father had left his family behind twice. The first time it had been Leslie. The second time Emily. That’s why he went back for her. Unlike Leslie, Emily had been alone.

 

 _Two:_ Before he left, there had been a place where her father and Emily had been a family. A childhood home.  _Go big or go home_. She bet he taught that to Emily. She bet Emily thought of that when she hid the evidence in the one place only her father would guess. The last time they had been a family. Her childhood home.

 

 _Three:_ Nelson knows Pawnee is Leslie’s home. It is the place to which she will always return. It’s been six weeks. Grist is wrong. Nelson isn’t there to just take a look around the town and leave. He is camped out there, waiting, for Leslie to come back. Find Leslie, find Grace.

 

And for the smallest moment, Leslie has never been so thankful for Chris Traeger. He went against his friends. He had gotten Grace to safety even when it cost him everything. It cost him his partner and best friend. It made a murderer out of him.

 

But she can’t think about Chris right now. Not when everything she has been searching for is stretched out on a carpet in front of her.

 

“I know where it is,” Leslie whispers, “I know where Emily hid the evidence.”

 

***

 

In the windowless room Ron has no sense of time. He could have been in there for hours, days, or weeks. He doesn’t know. Someone shoves food down his throat just before the beatings start again. Ron counts the times between the beatings, but then he loses track. He isn’t sure if the number gets to big or his brain just can’t hold onto the number any more.

 

And then there is a day when the routine changes. The door is thrown open and Nelson stands backlight in the doorway. He strides over to Ron and with the butt of his gun hits him across the face. He beats him with it and Ron almost gives in. He almost begs for the man to turn the gun around and just shoot him. Almost dares him.

 

But Nelson is screaming about his friends. Ann and his friends. They blew up the restored power grid. It was Ken Hoate and the Wamapoke, Nelson shouts. The grid had been on their land and he let them keep it in exchange for their allegiance. They got access to limitless energy, but that hadn’t been enough. They let Ron’s friends in. They helped set the explosives. The turncoats. The whole town is cut off from the rest of the world now. There is no way to call in reinforcements or know what was happening elsewhere. They will pay for what they have done, Nelson hits Ron over and over as the words spill out.

 

And it is that tiny bit of information that is enough for Ron to hang on. He laughs that pitched giggle he has when something is just so delightful he can’t help it. Of course Ann would blow up the power grid. His beautiful Ann.

 

If she could rally the town, then the least Ron can do is survive.

 

***

 

Really it is simple from there.

 

Grist takes her to the house. It is out in the country, a little white bungalow with over grown hydrangea bushes. They park on the road and approach the house from the back. Leslie notes the tire swing and one of those plastic turtle sandboxes. She can see it, the childhood of the sister she never knew. She can see the candy salesman father pushing Emily on the swing. There is a slab of concrete. She imagines he put a grill there and in the summer cooked dinner for his family. His second family.

 

She wonders if he ever thought about her and Marlene. His first family.

 

But she pushes that aside and follow Grist into the house.

 

The flower wall paper is peeling in the kitchen and the lace curtains are stained brown. There is furniture, but most of it is broken. Leslie picks up a bent picture frame and turns it over. It is her father and a woman, blond, and a little girl in pigtails. The glass is cracked where someone clearly slammed the frame down on the corner of a table.

 

“What happened here Grist? Did Emily's mother do the same thing my mother did?”

 

“I don’t know. I wasn’t here for that one. Emily was older, a teenager, when it happened and her mother was different than yours. She needed him more. But I imagine it was pretty much the same. The result was. He lost them.”

 

Leslie slips the picture out of the frame and into her back pocket. She takes it for Grace. Grace would need to know someday who it was that loved her first, Emily Zale.

 

“Almost makes you feel sorry for the guy,” Leslie says.

 

“I kept telling him to stop trying to make a family.”

 

“I said almost.” Leslie kicks her boot along the floor. “Let’s find this precious evidence and get out of here.”

 

They search the house and find nothing. Grist swears in the living room, but Leslie closes her eyes. She imagines she is Emily. She didn’t know the woman, but they share a daughter. They had been sisters. When she hid the evidence she must have been thinking of Grace, of keeping her safe, of ensuring her safety, and Leslie imagines her candy salesman father. He would have come and gone a lot. Maybe he brought Emily postcards like he had Leslie. She would have looked at them when she missed him. She would have kept them safe.

 

Leslie’s feet take the stairs two at a time. She picks the smallest bedroom, the one that faces east so it catches the morning sunlight, the first echoes of the day, and goes to the closet. It is small, but it is big enough for a little girl to tuck herself into. She traces the crayon drawings on the wall, the places where Emily wrote in the names of her friends: Hannah, Mr. Bearcy, and Dr. Houndtooth the Terrible. Her imaginary friends. Leslie kneels in the closet and searches until she finds the loose floorboard. She pries it back and she hears Grist behind her, swear. He shines a flashlight and there it is - a small metal box. Underneath the postcards is a flash drive. She gives it to Grist who looks like he might cry. She’s never seen the man smile a real smile before.

 

She stands, “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

 

She takes the box, with the postcards, with her. She doesn’t show Grist the second thing Emily left in there.

 

A pink envelope with her name written on it.  _Leslie Barbara Knope_.

 

***

 

After the power grid, Nelson watches them torture Ron. He stands in the corner of the room with his arms folded and waits while the soldiers water board Ron. The questions shift from Leslie to Ron’s friends.  _Where are they hiding out? What do they plan to do? Who is helping them?_

 

But he gives them nothing. If Ron didn’t give up Leslie, why did they think he’d give them anything on Ann?

 

He thinks of her sometimes, of her pretty eyes and the lilt in her voice when she teases him. He never catches it the first time. He never knows she is joking until her lips curve up in a smile. He holds onto the image of that smile when they strap electrodes to him and shoot energy through his body.

 

Over and over again Ron holds onto to Ann and the knowledge that somewhere out there she is with their friends. She is the one who taught him that strength isn’t a force. It isn’t measured by how much red meat you eat or how well you worked with wood. Strength was endurance. It was holding onto the things that are good no matter how terrible the world gets. It takes a strong heart to do that.

 

So he lets himself scream when they hurt him. He screams loud and long because dammit it hurts. They can hurt him all they want, he thinks, because Ann will put him back together. All he has to do is hold onto his heart.

 

And then one day when the pain just won’t stop. They brought knives today. Knives and something heavy they use to break the bones in his right hand. One by one. A bone for a question, Nelson tells Ron.

 

“You are the only one who can stop this, Ronald.” Nelson says.

 

“Fuck you.”

 

“You aren’t going to survive forever.”

 

“If I can survive Tammy…” He never finishes the sentence because there is an explosion. Ron isn’t sure if it is in his head or real. Everything is swimming. He is swimming. His vision clouds and in the distance he hears a  _pop, pop, pop_.

 

Because the mind is strange he thinks of Leslie just then. The Leslie who he first hired. She was peppy and young and bright eyed. She would sit in his office and say, “Please Ron. Ron, please. Please. Please. Please.”

 

It really was annoying. If he ever sees her again he is going to tell her that.

 

And then he sees April. She has a knife and idly he reminds her to clean it after she is done. And the world spins again. He feels himself tip forward and he waits to hit the floor, but he doesn’t. Instead, he bumps into a shoulder. He hears someone say, “Easy with him. Watch his hand. Jesus, look at what they did to him.”

 

And then April again. She holds his face in both her hands and she tells him she is sorry, but they need him to be quiet and he’s not quiet. And then she presses a cloth to his face and Ron sees black.

 

***

 

April hovers on the edge of the room as Ann moves over Ron. Ben tugs her back, but she shrugs him off. He and Mark back out of the room and it is just Ann cutting away the dirty rags Ron wears, swearing under her breath, and imploring April to get the fuck over here and help her.

 

“He looks shredded,” April sinks to her knees besides Ron. He is laid out in what used to be a storeroom in the Sweetums factory. Spread out on a table is every medical tool they have. Ann fills a silver bowl with ice and gently eases his right hand into it.

 

“That is going to be a bitch to put back together,” she is talking more to herself than April.

 

“Is he going to make it?”

 

“April, don’t ask. Just do. I need you to sit on him. We don’t have anything to knock him out and once I start setting the bones he is going to wake up.”

 

“Shouldn’t we get Mark. He’s bigger.”

 

“Mark throws up at the sight of blood.”

 

“Ben then.”

 

“He’s not much bigger than you. I’m strong. I can handle his arm. I need you to do the rest. April, can you do this?”

 

She rolls her eyes. “What do you think?”

 

Ann smiles, “God, I’m glad you’re back.”

 

***

 

When they emerge hours later, Ben pushes whiskey into both of their hands. Ann sinks down into the plush leather chairs of the Sweetums executive board room. Spread out on the conference table are maps of Pawnee, marked up with their weapons stores. Tom is showing Mark where his black market friends have hidden their contraband.

 

Ben studies April. “You okay?”

 

“I almost had Nelson,” She mutters. “When the bomb went off he was the first into the hall. If there hadn’t been so much smoke I would have had a clean shot. I hesitated. I wasn’t sure it was him.”

 

“That’s good. We’re not here to kill innocent people.”

 

“None of them are innocent. They tortured Ron.”

 

“We’ll get him.”

 

“Yeah, whatever.” She sinks down into the chair next to Ann. “What’s next?”

 

Ann looks at all of them and settles on Ben. “Where the hell is Grace?”

 

Mark holds up a hand, “That’s my fault. I was with Chris, protecting her, and one night he slipped out of the apartment with her.”

 

“We found him,” Ben gestures to Mark, “the next morning and the three of us have spent the last six weeks tracking Chris all over Indiana. Mark’s helped us exhaust Grist’s network, but Chris has gone rogue. No one working for Grist and Zale know where he is. Then we got word about Nelson being here so we figured we better come back.”

 

“And Leslie. We heard about Leslie taking off,” April says.

 

“She’ll come back,” Ann drinks the last of her whiskey.

 

“That’s what we’ve got to prevent.” Ben leans on the table. “Someone has to find her and keep her out of Pawnee.”

 

“Good luck,” Donna snorts.

 

The corner’s of Ann’s mouth turn down. “She’s right. Leslie won’t stay away. I think Nelson is banking on that.”

 

“It’s just a matter of time before word gets to New D.C. about whats going on here.” Mark says.

 

“New D.C., that’s where you think she is?” This is Tom.

 

April just searches the bottom of her glass. She swirls the last of the whiskey, but doesn’t sip it. She keeps replaying it over and over in her mind:  the day they burst into the apartment to find only Mark. How all three of them held their guns up until April promised Ben that Mark was one of the good guys. And when he explained his role in the kidnapping of Grace, April didn’t bother to try to hold Ben back when he went after the guy. He broke his nose. But in the aftermath, Ben’s logic took over and he listened to reason. Mark thought he had been helping Leslie. That’s what he’d been told. Mark agreed to help them try to find Chris and they spent weeks traipsing around Indiana as they searched for Ben’s partner. The man responsible for Andy’s murder.  
  
April touches the knife in its holster around her waist. She hasn’t forgotten. But sometime in the weeks her anger dulled. Everything about her dulled. The grief and fury and fear all dulled until she feels nothing. She wonders, almost from a distance, if she’ll begin to feel again once she kills someone. Once Andy’s death is avenged, will the parts of her heart begin to work again?

 

“Well that settles it,” Ben is saying. He looks at April to see if she is listening. He does that now - study her as if he is worried about her. She wants to tell him to stop. “We’ll send someone to get a message to Leslie, but if it doesn’t get through or if she doesn’t listen we better get ready.”

 

“Ready for what?” April rolls her eyes.

 

“For the battle for Pawnee.”

 

***

 

When they get back to her father’s bar, Leslie pulls a gun on Harvey Grist. She waits until he takes the keys out of the ignition. He isn’t looking at her and that is why she gets the upper hand. She presses the barrel of the gun to his temple.

 

“What the hell are you doing?”

 

“Going home.”

 

“Your father won’t allow it. It’s a suicide mission.”

 

“They’re my family,” Leslie presses the gun harder against his head. “Now give me the keys. You got your evidence. Do whatever the hell you want with it, but it’s not my problem anymore.”

 

“Your father is going to be a hero. The people are going to elect him president. The military is going to fall at his feet for bringing the world’s worst criminal to justice. You’ll be right there as he rebuilds this country. Isn’t that what you wanted once? To be part of history? ”

 

“You and my father know nothing about me.”

 

Grist drops the keys into the console between them.

 

“You can put the gun down,” he says, “I’m not going to stop you.”

 

“What?”

 

“I’ve known you since you were a kid Leslie. I do know you. You’re a lot like your old man, but you were always your mother’s daughter. Strong and loyal to the end.”

 

“Don’t talk about my mother. You have no idea who I am.”

 

“I know you fell in love with a man just like me and your father. Ben Wyatt is broken man. He left you to take after Grace. He lied to you. He is a lone agent. He’ll never be what you need. I know you think he’s different from us. That you and him and Grace aren’t doomed to repeat the mess your parents made.”

 

“Just get out of the truck.”

 

Grist eases out with both hands held out in front of him. Leslie keeps the gun pointed at his face as she eases into the driver seat and pushes the key into the ignition.

 

“If you care,” Grist yells as she starts the engine, “I hope you’re right.”

 

And then he turns his back on her and heads back into the bar, to her father and the only family he ever had.

 

Leslie doesn’t stop to consider. She whips the truck back onto the highway. She doesn’t exhale until she is outside of New D.C.. When she does she feels something pointing into the side of her leg. She reaches down and realizes that Grist left her his wallet. Inside is money and gold. What she’ll need to get home safely. She tucks it into the glove compartment and decides not to think about it.

 

Instead she focuses on the distance left between her, Ben, Grace, and home.

 

***

The battle for Pawnee begins at dawn.

 

 

Each day Pawnee citizens wake up to something new. One morning it is purple flyers with Nelson’s face X-ed out. They seem to litter the city overnight. Another morning people wake up to gifts of fresh vegetables left on porches, and another morning the shrill sound of firecrackers being set off outside Nelson’s office at City Hall. They are mundane acts and at first people are confused. The name _Pawnee Alliance_  is stamped at the bottom of the flyers and tagged on the gifts of much needed food. When the firecrackers go off, it isn’t hard to guess who it is.

 

Not that anyone is really sure who the Pawnee Alliance is or what it is that they want.

 

People hear stories of their neighbors being turned out of their homes to provide a place for soldiers, but they think its just a few isolated incidents. When the hospital starts turning people away who can’t “pay” people don’t believe it. Leslie Knope kept that hospital running after the bombs. Surely the rumors are wrong?

 

There are whispers and doubts, but no one believes it until the first morning they hear of Pawnee Alliance.

 

It is as the name gives Pawnee permission to think for itself. Just the knowledge that there are other people out there makes the ordinary citizen that much braver. No one incites open rebellion, but they are less friendly to the soldiers who knock on their doors asking about Leslie Knope and her baby. They stop handing over food grown in their gardens as if it belonged to the military. The black market flourishes as people circumvent the city markets for what they need. Neighbors let neighbors know of the illegal medical clinic being run out of the Pawnee Historical Society. Nurses and doctors stop showing up for work at St. Joseph’s entirely and teenagers blatantly ignore the new curfew imposed by their occupiers. People crowd City Hall to demand Joan and Howser remember to do their jobs and actually govern. Stop falling over Nelson like he is their savior.

 

Remember  _we_  did that, Pawnee says, in the aftermath of the bombs  _we_  pulled ourselves together.  _We_  found a way to work together, to survive, and rebuild. Stop forgetting us.

 

The battle for Pawnee begins each day at dawn when people wake up and remember this is  _their_ town.

 

***

 

Everything changes after the Pawnee Alliance blows up the power grid.

 

At first people resent it. Electricity made everyone feel like they might be getting back to normal. They began to hope this nightmare might not actually go on forever. But then they hear how Nelson hoarded the power for his troops. Nelson let a little light to dribble out as if that would appease the masses. He thought they were too stupid to know the difference.

 

After the bombing, they hear rumors that the Pawnee Alliance is working with Ken Hotate and the Wampaoke. Nelson’s men are actually being turned away at the doors of their casinos. A story spreads that Ken Hotate put a curse on Nelson. They whisper the man was stupid enough not to believe in it.

 

After the lights go out people are on edge. There are fights in the streets with soldiers. People raise their voices and then their fists. Nelson sets up a determent center in Pawnee High to contain the rebels. He stands on the front steps of City Hall and makes a speech about dissidents and how he will not let them steal peace of mind from Pawnee.

 

Someone throws a pie at him and he is rushed away by his security detail. Pawnee laughs. Nelson may be cruel, they think, but he is a coward.

 

 

***

 

The problem with open rebellion is that it is easy for someone to get killed.

 

After the pie, people start answering their doors with guns drawn. Soldiers come back to base reporting homes they can’t search for Leslie Knope and her baby. People refuse to give over food. There are hundreds of flyers now, more every day, of that first purple one. They blossom in the night, tacked to buildings and on the trees in parks. Nelson orders the streets patrolled after dark, but he doesn’t have enough men. He sends messengers to New D.C. to send more troops, but that will take time. He can’t make a call because the power grid is gone. And now the town has gotten out of control. They think that can stand up to him, but they don’t know what he did. No one does. He blew up the damn world.

 

And then one morning, Bert Macklin appears.

 

 ** _BERT MACKLIN LIVES!_** is spray painted everywhere. It is on the sidewalks and on garage doors. In loopy scrawl it is posted on either side of the front door to City Hall.

 

 ** _BERT MACKLIN LIVES!_** stands like a sentinel over the city.

 

Nelson doesn’t know who this Macklin fellow is, but there is something about the boldness of it. It is in the jaunt of the writing, the bright red paint, and the we-don’t-give-a-fuck permanence that just pisses him off.

 

He grabs a hand gun from one of his security men and marches into the center of the market. People mill from booth to booth, but they step back when they see him. He climbs onto the fountain at the center of the square. The water has long stopped running and it is filled with dried leaves.

 

“Who is Bert Macklin?” Nelson screams, but no one answers. His troops and Pawnee citizens look at him with the same confused faces. “Bert Macklin is no one. I will not be cowed. Whoever he is…him and his Pawnee Alliance cannot touch me.”

 

He sees fear in their faces and it makes him happy.

 

“Anyone who gives up Bert Macklin or this Pawnee Alliance will be richly awarded.” Nelson yells.

 

But there is silence. Nelson swings the arm holding the gun around over the crowd.

 

“I will kill one of you unless someone gives him up.” He cocks the gun. “I know you know something!”

 

He picks someone out of the crowd, a slim, pretty brunette, and has his soldiers drag her forward. He remembers her from the official contingent of citizens who welcomed them to town all those weeks ago. Shauna Something, he thinks. Shame. He always did like brunettes.

 

He reads tyranny in their silence. Assent to whoever Bert Macklin is, to the spirit of the discontent, to the open faced rejection of what he has done for these people. “Bert Macklin does not live,” he says right before he fires the gun.

 

***

 

“This has got to stop,” Ann protests. “No one else can die like that.”

 

She folds her arms tight against her chest and looks around the Sweetum’s board room. Everyone is there except for Jerry, who was busy counting the reams of paper they had left to make flyers.

 

“No.” April stares Ann down, “We’re finally starting to get to Nelson. I’m not stopping.”

 

“April, Shauna Mulwae-Tweep died today,” Ben says quietly.

 

“Andy  _died_  two months ago. My family  _died_ a year ago. That didn’t stop Nelson and it’s not going to stop me.”

 

“I’m with April,” Ron says. He cradles his broken, bandaged hand close to his stomach. The look Ann gives him hurts even Ben, who watches every person around the table.

 

They are not soldiers. Even though they have just started already they are battle weary. Ben had been in the crowd when Nelson shot Shauna in the head. He felt the twist in his gut when he hadn’t stepped up. When he just stood there.

 

The truth is he never believed Nelson would do it. Killing someone like that, in cold blood, in front of the town and his own men wasn’t insane. Thomas Nelson was already insane. They knew that.

 

Killing Shauna like that had been foolish. It dared the town to open riot. It made ordinary people into warriors.

 

Jerry told him more and more people were streaming into the Sweetum’s head quarters. They were coming with what they had:  food, weapons, and medical supplies. “How can we help?” they asked.

 

If Nelson has become that foolish, Ben knows the answer.  “April’s right,” he says. “We don’t stop.”

 

“Leslie would agree with me,” Ann counters. “People dying isn’t part of the plan.”

 

“How do you think this happens without people dying?” April snaps.

 

“Skinny legs McGee is right,” Donna says. “You’ve got to fight fire with fire.”

 

“Ann is right too,” Ron says. “Leslie would not approve of this.”

 

“Leslie isn’t here.” Tom mutters. Everyone looks at Ben

 

He drops a heavy hand onto the table.  “This isn’t a vote,” he says. “I’m in charge and I say we stick to the plan. That’s it.”

 

***

 

April follows Ben out after the meeting. “Thanks for backing me up in there.”

 

She is twitchy when he turns around as if she were nervous.

 

“I didn’t back you up. Continuing is the right thing to do even if it doesn’t sit right.” His tone is short and he sighs. Ever since they rescued Ron something had changed in April. She seemed lost. Her desire to revenge Andy scared him, but this willingness to take stupid risks scares him more.

 

“That’s not what I mean and you know it,” she says.

 

“That stunt was stupid.”

 

“But it worked.”

 

They are talking about  **BERT MACKLIN LIVES!** That had  _not_ been in the plan, but Ben told everyone else it had been his idea. He let it and Shauna’s death fall on his shoulders.

 

“Nelson is unpredictable. Pissing him off doesn’t help us. It just makes you feel better.”

 

“It worked,” she repeats stubbornly.

 

Ben takes a step closer to the girl. “You’ve got good instincts, April. But if you’re going to risk getting caught you better make sure its worth it. Petty vandalism isn’t worth it. It won’t bring Andy back.”

 

Something in her snaps shut when Ben says Andy’s name.

 

“And pretending Leslie is on her way won’t bring her back either,” she hisses and is gone.

 

**

 

_“You’re small,” Ben tells Leslie the first time he trains her how to fight. “So use your elbows and knees. That’s where your strength lies.”_

 

_He comes up behind her and presses a palm to her stomach. He can feel her quick gasp from his touch. It is the first time he’s touched her since they came back to Pawnee from Ron’s cabin. She hasn’t let him touch her. She doesn’t trust him, she says. Ben doesn’t blame her. He lied to her. He is continuing to keep his suspicions about her father to himself. He is not someone you trust._

 

_“I am not that small,” she counters._

 

_“Yes you are. But that’s a good thing. Use it as leverage.” He steps closer so his hips slot against the curve of her ass. They stand barefoot on the mat Leslie pulled out of her basement. Andy and April took Grace to one of the parks and so Ben insisted they use the uninterrupted time to train._

 

_Even though they’d only been at her house a few days Ben quickly realized that he shouldn’t be surprised by what Leslie can pull out of her basement. She has everything down here. Really, he thinks, he should stop being surprised by her completely._

 

_He looks over her shoulder toward the wall of documents just next to her front door. He remembers holding her up against that wall. It had been the first time they touched. He remembers pressing his lips to her pulse. Her hands had scrapped along his back. Ben remembers the way it felt to kiss her. It felt like riding a roller coaster and coming home at the same time. Her skin had been so soft and the way her teeth tugged on…_

 

 _And then he feels his center of gravity tip and he is upside down and then with an_ oof _he is lying flat on his back on the mat. Leslie bends over him and grins._

 

_“Why the hell did you do that?” He winces. She had taken him completely by surprise and flipped him over her shoulder._

 

_She pats his shoulder, “You were getting a little excited down there by my ass so I used my center of gravity for some leverage.”_

 

_**_

 

If Ben wants April to take risks that are worth it, fine. She waits until everyone else is asleep and sneaks past Jerry who was on guard duty tonight. It’s easy to pick her way through Pawnee neighborhoods and back to Ann’s house.

 

It never sat right with April how quickly Nelson’s forces found Ron. She grilled Ron a dozen times, but his memory was hazy. She admits her gut isn’t based on fact. It just didn’t make sense why Nelson would post that many guards at an abandoned house. Even if they thought Ann or someone associated with Leslie might show up, why post three guards at a house that hadn’t been lived in since the bombs? He didn’t have guards posted at her old house or anyone else from the Parks department.

 

April suspects it was just plain bad luck Ron ran into them. There had to be another reason why Nelson would post guards there. Something he is hiding.

 

She approaches the house from the alley. There is a white van parked in the neighbor’s driveway but otherwise the night is still. April moves silently just like Ben taught her. She’ll show them. She’ll prove that her way is right…

 

She stays in the shadows and keeps her eyes trained on the house, but there is no sign of movement. She is so focus on the house that the voice takes her by surprise.

 

“Hey there pretty lady.”

 

And then blackness.

 

**

 

When April comes to she is in a van. She is pressed against the cold metal wall and her head throbs. She stifles a moan and tries to orient herself in the darkness.

 

“No one is going to hear you,” the voice warns and then she sees who it was who attacked her. Sewage Joe.

 

A part of her curses herself for forgetting the first thing Ben taught her,  _always know your surroundings._ She had been so focused on proving to everyone that she was right that she had let her common sense lapse.

 

“What were you doing in that alley?” She moans and tries to move her hands and feet, but both are tied fast.

 

“I could ask you the same question,” he loosens the ties on her wrists and sits back.

 

“I asked first.”

 

“Nelson has been paying some of my buddies and me to keep watch on the house. Says we’re supposed to look for Leslie Knope in case she came back.”

 

“You’re a traitor. That man will destroy Pawnee.”

 

“My only allegiance is to myself and Nelson pays better than your little rebellion. He’s going to make me the richest man in Pawnee. How can I say no to such an easy gig? Though I wished he’d let us go in the house. It would be loads better than this van. Can’t even stand up in the damn thing.”

 

So April had been wrong and now here she was. Maybe Ben was right. Maybe she was taking stupid risks. She can just hear Andy now,  _Babe, you’re the smart one. Stop._

 

“What do you want from me?”

 

“Oh, I figured you are just a nice bonus for me,” he hovers over her with a malicious grin, “There was one time I asked you if you wanted to see my van, but this time I figure I’m not going to bother asking.”

 

But he moves too slowly. April pulls her fist upward and hits him in the balls as hard as she can. Sewage Joe is nothing more than a gangly, slimy vulture. He is easy. He falls over onto his knees and huddles on the van floor. She rears her tied ankles back and slams them into his nose, sending the bones upward with a crack.

 

“BITCH,” he screams as blood pools around his face, but April doesn’t look back. She slides the van door wide, tugs the knots loose on her feet, and sprints down the alley as Sewage Joe howls like the dog he is.

 

**

 

April doesn’t stop until she clears the alley. She stops on the edge of Lot 48 and as the adrenaline fades she falls onto her knees in the soft grass. There is still a pile of dirt from when Leslie filled the pit in right before the bombs. Andy had lived in that pit for a while, April thinks. Only Andy could be happy even while living in a pit. She feels tears prick the corners of her eyes.

 

Under the moon, she reaches for the knife tucked into her pants. Idiot didn’t even search her for weapons. She promises herself she’ll never tell anyone about this. It is embarrassing someone like him got the jump on her.

 

She turns the knife over in her hands. For a moment, April lets herself shudder. It is wicked looking weapon. When Ben had given it to her she felt a sense of direction, purpose. But now she isn’t sure it will do anything that matters. Oh, she is going to still stick it in Chris’ chest and use it to slit Nelson’s throat, but she has to admit it won’t do the one thing she wants.

 

It won’t bring Andy back.

 

**

 

“Dammit woman, I’ll use government documents if I want to!” Ron bellows.

 

“Suit yourself. See if I care,” Ethel Beavers says.

 

Ben watches from a distance. He has gotten used to the shouting matches between Ron and Ethel Beavers. Everyone has. The two of them are the Pawnee Alliances’ munitions experts. No one was more surprised than Ben when it was Ethel Beavers who constructed the devices that blew up the power grid.

 

“In my youth, I dabbled in explosives.  It drove the boys wild.” the old woman shrugged the first time Ben questioned her abilities.

 

But after he witnessed the effectiveness of her work, he had no doubts. Since Ron was a wanted man so he had to stay safely tucked away in the Sweetum’s complex. The man hated being off the front lines, but with his broken hand there isn’t much he can do anyway. What he could do was make whatever the Pawnee Alliance needed and thus one of the strangest partnerships Ben has ever seen was born.  They worked at a long series of tables in the Sweetums warehouses. Various guns, materials for improvised bombs, and the like were spread out like some sort of mad man’s workshop.

 

In the wake of Shauna’s death, Ann asked Ron to come up with non-lethal options. An IED packed with confetti made out of government documents was the best he could do. Ben didn’t want to be the one to point out that no one would be able to tell the paper used to be government documents. Ron’s middle finger to the government would literally be miniscule. There is a better chance the confetti would be burned up in the initial blast. It would be hardly more than a flashbang, but Ron was trying to appease Ann because he loved her. Ben could understand that.

 

He leaves the reasoning to Ethel and moves past the two. He is determined to leave it alone. Strategy is his speciality, not weapons. And strategy is his problem right now. The truth is he thought he would have heard from Leslie by now.

 

 _She could be dead_.

 

Ben doesn’t let himself think the whole thought. He tells himself over and over again that if Leslie Knope were dead, Thomas Nelson would know about it. He would stop looking for her in Pawnee. The day Nelson leaves Pawnee in any way but a coffin will be the worst  day of Ben’s life.

 

He tells no one, but he really misses Leslie. Of course everyone assumes he misses her, but he  _misses_ her. He missed being able to talk to her. He wants - no, needs - her opinion on his ideas. He wants her optimism and confidence. He misses  _her_.

 

But whatever she is doing, whatever it is that keeps her from Pawnee, Ben knows it has to be for Grace…

 

“Someone help me! HELP”

 

And as if someone had hit him upside the head, Ben tumbles toward the voice. The door from the back of Sweetums’ warehouses slams shut and echoes off the high ceilings. Ben, Ron, and Ethel all look up and there she is - Leslie with her shiny blond hair - she is right in front of him like some sort of apparition. But then she keeps yelling and Ben sees instantly why. She is half-carrying, half-dragging an almost unconscious April.

 

“Get Ann,” Ben orders to no one in particular.

 

Leslie drags April to the nearest table and hauls her up. Ben sees the wound on the girl’s head bleeding out.

 

“How…what…”

 

“I found her collapsed in Lot 48,” Leslie breathes. Her hands make quick work across April’s body to check for additional injuries. “She came to just long enough to tell me where I could find you guys. But it was sunrise and I had to drag her into an abandoned house because there were patrols coming. We had to stay there all day.”

 

“Leslie -,” he stammers. He really can’t believe she is here. She is trembling.

 

“I had to wait until it got dark before I could risk taking her out. She’s been bleeding from that head wound most of the day. I did the best I could but I don’t know…”

 

“Leslie,” Ben grabs her hands and holds them tight over April’s body. “She’ll be alright. You’re alright. You’re home.”

 

For the first time she looks at him straight on and Ben feels a bubble of gratitude burst in him. She had come back to them whole and alive. And then Ann is there and she sends Ron running for the medical kit.

 

“I’m a universal donor,” Leslie stammers as Ann measures the girl’s pulse and curses. It has become impossibly slow. She is already threading a needle into April’s arm and hooking the tube to the bag of blood Ethel retrieved from the single fridge they powered using solar panels.

 

“Ben take her up to the infirmary and put a tube in her arm,” Ann snaps. “We’re going to need more.” When neither of them move because they don’t want to leave April, Ann snaps. “Out. Now.”

 

**

 

Ben’s hands shake as he pushes the needle into the crook of Leslie’s elbow. They both sigh with relief with the clear plastic tube fills with bright red.

 

“It’ll take about ten minutes,” Ben says.

 

Leslie sags against a table. Ben sinks down into the chair next to her. He watches her carefully.

 

“What?” she says it quietly.

 

“You’re here.” His voice chokes up. “I just can’t believe you’re here.”

 

“Grist took me to New D.C.. I helped him and my dad find the evidence that proves Nelson planned the attacks.”

 

“What was it?”

 

“Computer files,” she shrugs, “I didn’t stay to figure it out. That’s my father’s business. Mine was back here in Pawnee.”

 

“Grace is still missing.” Ben touches a single finger along the length of her arm resting on the table. He waits and when she doesn’t pull away he leans forward until his head lies along her palm. He explains how Chris disappeared with her. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I couldn’t do it.”

 

Leslie threads her hand through his hair and kisses the crest of his head, “I don’t trust Chris,” she says, “But I do trust him to keep Grace away from Pawnee. We’ll find her after we stop Nelson.”

 

There it is - the confidence and optimism Ben missed so very much. It didn’t change his dread, but it made it more bearable.

 

“I got lucky when I found April,” she continues filling the space between them. After months apart, Ben would think all he would want to do is talk to her, but really now all he wants is to hear her voice. He wants it to fill up the spaces inside him that hurt so much.

 

“At first I was afraid you were all dead or gone, but then I saw  **BERT MACKLIN LIVES!** And it gave me hope.So I camped out near Ann’s house to watch for you guys. I didn’t know where else to go.”

 

Ben tells her how Ron was captured there and then tortured.

 

“Leslie, it’s not safe for you here,” he breathes. "It's foolish to stay."

 

“I am tired of running. This is my home. Nelson doesn’t get to take that away from me.”

 

Something in Ben deflates. That is the major difference between them. Her life is so precious to him that he’d be happy to spend their whole lives running if it meant she and Grace were safe. But Leslie wouldn’t settle for that. She wanted to live. She wanted her daughter to get a chance to be safe and happy. After a year of loving Leslie Knope Ben has learned to stop getting in her way.

 

“But you still have your vote. Remember?” she murmurs. “When I asked you to follow my gut you did it and Andy ended up dead because of me.”

 

“That’s not true.”

 

“It feels true. If your gut says I am more of a liability than an asset then I’ll go Ben. I’ll search for Chris and Grace. I’ll let you fight this fight for me. You’re my partner and I trust you to do it as much as I trust myself.”

 

“No.”

 

“What?”

 

There is so much between them, he thinks. So much pain and questions, but there is something deeper too. A need that had been there since the first time they touched. It went beyond flesh and feelings.

 

He links fingers with her own. “I need you. Stay.”

 

**

 

When April wakes up it is Ann Perkins who leans over her.

 

“Ugh, you.” April moans. Everything about her body aches.

 

“Drink. Swallow.” The nurse pushes a glass of water and two pills into April’s palm.

 

“What happened?”

 

“Leslie found you bleeding from the head in Lot 48.”

 

_Though I wished he’d let us go in the house. It would be loads better than this van._

 

That glaring detail from Sewage Joe’s rambling explanation presses forward. How could she have missed it? Nelson didn’t want anyone in that house because he was hiding something there. She  _had_ been right.

 

“I need to see Ben,” April struggles to stand up. There is panic in her goice, but Ann pushes her down.

 

“Oh, no you don’t. You need rest.”

 

“STOP TELLING ME WHAT I NEED. YOU’RE NOT MY FUCKING MOTHER!”

 

It comes from somewhere so deep inside of her that it shocks even April. She can feel the tremble run up her spine.

 

But Ann simply sets her jaw. “Maybe you need a mother.”

 

“I’m not a child.”

 

“But you are headstrong and foolish. Andy would never be okay with you going off alone like that. Using his name to piss of a lunatic. Carrying around a knife to plunge into someone’s chest. If you do that you won’t be any better than them. If he were here he’d tell you that and since he’s not anymore I guess it’s got to be me.”

 

“I hate you.”

 

“That’s fine,” Ann crosses her arms. “Hate me if it makes you feel better, but I’m done watching you act like you are alone.”

 

“I am alone.”

 

“Thats not true. You have us,” Ann gentles, “and you have your baby. Andy’s baby.”

 

“What?”

 

“I used a sonogram machine to see if you had any internal bleeding and there was a heart beat.” She places a palm on April’s stomach, “Right here.”

 

**

 

April explains what she knows.

 

Ann insists she stay in bed for the rest of the evening so everyone pools into her room. When Leslie arrived, she held her in a tight hug for so long that Ann had to intervene.

 

“She’s not going anywhere,” the nurse said.

 

“But she’s going to be okay?” Leslie’s eyes were wet with tears. She squeezed April’s hand.

 

Ann met April’s eye and nodded. “She’ll be fine with a little time.”

 

April doesn’t know how to feel toward the older woman; she still resented what Ann said to her, but she is grateful too. It feels like she has a coconspirator regarding this sudden, unexpected baby. For the first time in a long time, April does not feel entirely alone.

 

But she pushes every stray thought aside and tells them about her suspicions and Sewage Joe.

 

“What do you think is in there?” Tom asks.

 

“Do you think it’s Grace?” Leslie pales beside Ben. “Do you think they captured them?”

 

“If he did have Grace I don’t know why he would stay in Pawnee,” Ben points out. “The only reason he wants you is to get to her.”

 

“Then what do you think it is?”

 

This is from Mark. He leans against the furthest corner, the odd man out of a very old gang.

 

Ben shrugs, “I don’t know. Whatever it is I think it is his trump card. If things don’t go his way I think whatever he is hiding is his back up plan. We need to take it from him.”

 

“So how do you propose we get it?” Ron blusters. “He’ll know being inconspicuous isn’t going to work anymore. That neighborhood will be crawling with soldiers.”

 

Ben glances at Leslie. “Are you ready to take your home back?”

 

“Yes.”

 

A look passes between them. April sees it. It is trust and love. She misses that so much it pangs her side, but then maybe that is the baby reminding her that she isn’t alone any more.

 

“So what’s the plan?” April asks.

 

Ben exhales. One by one, he fixes one each person.

 

“Donna do you still know how to hotwire a Benz?”

 

“Boy please!”

 

“Mark, you used to be the city planner. Do you think you know the sewer system well enough to navigate us through it?”

 

“Probably.”

 

“Tom, we’re going to round up all of our people. We need to start cashing in some of those favors. Can you do that?”

 

“Guilt tripping people is my speciality.”

 

“Ron, we’re going to need you and Ethel to make a few IEDs. I’m sorry Ann, but they’re going to need to be real ones. Okay with that?”

 

Ann smiles, “Let’s blow them straight to hell.”

 

Ron grins and wraps an arm around her waist, “That’s my girl.”

 

“What can I do, Ben?” Jerry wrings his hands nervously.

 

Ben smiles, “There are going to be kids whose parents are involved in the fight. We’ll come up with a place to keep them safe and out of the way. We need you to be a dad and help keep them calm.”

 

Jerry smiles, “I can do that.”

 

“Alright,” Ben beams. He grabs Leslie’s hand, “Leslie and I will lead the diversion. When the time is right Mark and April will lead a team of people into that house and we’ll take whatever it is that Nelson is hiding. We’re going to take back our town once and for all. We'll start tomorrow at dawn.”

 

Champion chooses that moment to jump onto the bed with April and bury his head in her feet. She scratches behind his hears and whispers to the dog, “Bert Macklin lives."

 

***

 

The plan is simple and yet Ben can’t stop going over it in his head.

 

 

_Cars. City Hall. Sewers. Retreat. Cars. City Hall. Sewers. Retreat._

 

A thousand things could go wrong and there was nothing Ben could do about it. No plan. No calculations. It scared him until his very muscles were tired from seizing. Every time he came up with another way they could fail, he went rigid, still, all the way down to his bones.

 

After their meeting Leslie stays back with April for a long time. She sits with the girl, Ann hovering in the background, and Ben hears Leslie’s confession just as he is leaving the room:   _I’m so sorry. It’s my fault and I am sorry_.

 

It isn’t her fault and Ben hopes someday she will be able to accept that. In a world like this fault is not something easily held onto. Life didn’t allow for black and white divisions. It was all more thickly drawn than that.

 

He retreats to the office he has been sleeping in. He lays on top of his sleeping bag and presses a hand to his forehead. Inexplicably, he thinks of Chris. He wishes his partner, the man he used to know, was here. He misses his former friend. The work they did before had been easy compared to this.

 

“You look like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders.”

 

Leslie leans against the doorway. Ben jumps up and casts around the room. There is no where to sit - just a desk pushed up against the far wall, his small pack of possessions, and his sleeping bag.

 

“Hey,” he stutters, “come in.”

 

Leslie slips the door closed behind her and leans against it. She tucks her hands behind her back and looks at him with a heavy gaze. Ben can read her want; he feels it in his gut. In the quiet calm before battle everyone has hidden away in their corners to be alone. It is the first time since Leslie returned that they’ve truly been alone. 

 

“Do you want to sit down?” he gestures at his sleeping bag and winces. “I didn’t mean. I mean I wasn’t inviting you to lay down on my bed. Not that its a bed. Really a sleeping bag. Like camping except I hate camping.”

 

“I still find that really ironic for a spy.”

 

“Agent. Remember I was just the numbers guy. Never the spy.”

 

There is tiny change in how she looks at him when he says that, as if his words shift something in her brain, and it propels her away from the wall to close the distance separating them.

 

Ben wavers under Leslie’s arms coming up around his neck as she kisses him. There is no other way to describe it - Leslie takes him. She grabs his shirt and pulls him down to her level. She arches her body against his and Ben moans from the contact. It takes him by surprise how she comes at him with such force as if she just can’t stay away from him. His feet shuffle to regain balance and by the time he does she is already pulling away.

 

“I’m sorry,” she says, “I thought things were the same.”

 

“They aren’t,” he rasps and he sees the disappointment and hurt in her eyes. “They aren’t the same. They’re more.”

 

“More?”

 

“I love you more than I ever thought it was possible to love someone. Losing you did that to me.”

 

Leslie lifts a hand to trace his face. She pushes against his hips with her own and gives a wicked grin. “Then why are we still talking?”

 

His heart flutters at her wicked cackle when he gathers her up in his arms. She hooks her legs over his hips and he picks her up so he can kiss her breastbone, bury his face in her chest, and feel her exhale against his cheek. She is everything in his arms:  soft skin, sharp inhales, and tugging hands. He breaks away from kissing her breast through her shirt to glance around the room.

 

“We haven’t done it on a desk yet, have we?”

 

She hums in anticipation, “We can pretend its the Resolute Desk. You can call me Madame President.”

 

“Anything in the service of my country.”

 

***

 

Later, when they are tucked into Ben’s sleeping bag, sweat sheening off their backs, Ben kisses the bridge of Leslie’s nose.

 

“You know its gone,” she tucks her chin into the curve of his neck, “DC. The Resolute Desk. The White House. This country. It’s all gone.”

 

“We’re still here. And Pawnee. People like us and your dad standing up against madmen like Nelson.” Ben plays with her hair. He never thought it possible, but he missed being about to touch her hair. The way the curls always tug back into place fascinate him.

 

“I don’t know if I want to be associated with people like my Grist and my dad.”

 

Ben sits up a little, “What happened with your dad?”

 

She plays with edge of the sleeping bag and Ben has to nudge her again.

 

“Nothing,” she says flatly. “Nothing happened and that was kind of the point. He barely spoke to me. He certainly didn’t try to make up for lost time or explain himself. Grist did all of that. My dad was too busy trying to stop Nelson.”

 

“Maybe that the best he can do.”

 

“What do mean?”

 

Ben shrugs, “I’m not saying it’s enough, but maybe the best way he knows how to love you is to keep his distance. Stopping Nelson is his way of loving you and Grace and your sister’s memory.”

 

“Maybe,” Leslie sighs, “but the result is the same. It doesn’t hurt any less.”

 

Ben kisses the crown of her head, “He is a fool, Leslie. You’re entirely loveable.”

 

And those words unravel something in her. The tears spill over and her tiny mewl of a cry cuts him deep. Ben wraps himself around her until her back is pressed to his chest. He covers her hands with his and tucks his ankles around her calves. This is loving, he thinks, hurting with someone.

 

***

 

“You can’t go,” Ann tells April when Leslie leaves. She hovers, smoothing out invisible wrinkles on April’s bed. “If they knew you were pregnant they would never agree to you leading this mission. Ben and Leslie and Ron would tie you to that bed.”

 

“That’s why you’re not going to tell them,” April punches her pillow.

 

“Think of your baby.”

 

“I am thinking of my baby.”

 

“How?”

 

“I don’t have to explain my choices to you.” April curls around Champion and away from Ann. “I don’t have to explain my choices to anyone.”

 

There is a pause and a sigh. “You’re right.”

 

This catches April off guard. She sits up and eyes the older woman. “You’re seriously okay with this?”

 

“No, I’m not. I think it is selfish and stupid.”

 

“But you’re not going to tell on me?”

 

“No, I’m not,” Ann’s shoulders slope. “Because the faster this world unravels the easier it’ll be for what little progress we’ve made to slip away. Every part of me may disagree with your choice, but it is still your choice.”

 

April frowns. She thinks of Andy and to be totally honest she has no idea what Andy would want her to do. Be safe. He’d want her to be safe. She knows that, but there is a deadness wedged in her stomach that scares April. Since Andy died she hasn’t felt anything and even she knows that isn’t good. It isn’t safe to keep living on that ledge, for her or any future child she might have. Stopping Nelson, she hopes, will do something to knock that heaviness loose.

 

She focuses on scratching Champion’s ear. “Will you come with me?”

 

“What?” Ann stumbles.

 

“Whatever. It’s dumb.”

 

“You want me to come with you?”

 

April lifts a shoulder, “Yeah. To keep the baby safe. I mean if you’re really that worried I just thought it might make you feel better. I don’t know why you’re worried. I was pregnant when I was in Indianapolis and when I got hit on the head and we’re both fine. I didn’t suddenly become an invalid, but if it would make you feel better come with us. Or don’t. I don’t care.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“You will?”

 

And suddenly April feels less alone. It’s not quite the same as emotion, but she bites her lip to keep from smiling a little.

 

“Yes. Now get some sleep.” Ann says. “Ben says we leave in the morning.”

 

***

 

“Dammit, you’re staying here and I’m the one going out there.”

 

Ron shouts and his voice echoes in the upper rafters of the Sweetum’s warehouse. Next to him Ethel putters over wires unfazed. Ann raises an eyebrow and part of him wishes she had more of a temper. He knew how to handle a temper, but her quiet determination disarmed him every time.

 

“You have a shredded hand and you think I’m going to  _let_  you go out there to set bombs?” She leans both palms on the table. “You’re delusional.”

 

“You don’t let me do anything.”

 

“Then you don’t get to forbid me from going.” There it is - the shout in her voice, but even then Ron isn’t sure what he can say or do to convey the deep, unending worry he feels toward her. It is all the time. He can’t help it.

 

“I need you safe,” he mumbles.

 

“And I need you safe.”

 

“That makes no sense,” he sputters. He wants to shout and storm off, but Ann round the table and boxes him in.

 

“You can’t set the bombs with one hand and I am going to go because April is going and its my job to look after her. It’s what Andy would have wanted. So teach me how set the damn devices.”

 

Ron frowns and finds her elbow with his good hand. He massages her upper arm and feels her give a little, lean into him a bit.

 

“You’re a good person,” he whispers, “a better person than me.”

 

She places a hand on his chest and kisses him lightly. “You’re getting there.” She smiles and Ron pulls her close.

 

“Can someone get me a sweater?” Ethel calls out. “It’s freezing in here.”

 

***

 

Donna’s team leaves first to get into place. It is her, Tom, and a mass of Pawnee citizens, including Ben and Derek, Dr. Harris, and Lucy. Everyone here has a stake in this, Ben thinks. This isn’t just about Leslie and Grace. It is about all of them.

 

“Don’t move until we give the signal,” Ben reminds Donna and she rolls her eyes.

 

“We got this.”

 

April’s team leaves next. It is just her and Mark and Ann. Ben had gone over that decision a thousand times. Should he send more people with them? What if they run into soldiers? What if one of them gets hurt? But in the end Ben knew it was smartest to keep April’s team small, mobile, and reserved to the Parks department. Whatever Nelson was hiding, Ben wanted it in the hands of his own people.

 

Ben, Leslie, and Ron see them off alone in one of the sewage connections beneath the Sweetum’s factory. Ron holds onto Ann the longest until she finally kisses him swiftly and shoulders her knapsack.

 

Leslie hugs her best friend and Ben knocks shoulders with April.

 

“Don’t forget the first rule.” He chides.

 

“Always know your surroundings.”

 

“Got your knife?”

 

She holds up the wicked blade. Ben hopes she doesn’t need to use it; he hopes that she won’t go looking for a reason to use it, but he is glad she has it.

 

“Don’t die,” he says.

 

“April, you know we love you, right?” Leslie’s voice chokes as she pulls April into a tight hug.

 

“Stop,” the younger girl mumbles, but she doesn’t pull away.

 

And then they are gone and Ben is placing the heavy metal lid back.

 

Ron rubs his injured hand and stares hard at the place where their friends last were. “This better work,” he says.

 

***

 

The first sign of battle is a shriek of explosives that shatter the glass in every window of City Hall. Ben shields Leslie’s body with his own. The earth shakes beneath them and for a second neither breathes and then the rest of their team whoops. There are shouts and people are rushing up the steps of the building.

 

Leslie gazes at Ben with wide eyes, “I can’t believe we just did that.”

 

A pellet of gunfire erupts and Ben grabs her hand, “Come on,” he says, “we’re not done yet.”

 

The second round of explosions goes off just like Ron and Ethel promised they would, clearing the doors right off the front of City Hall. Smoke billows around them and Ben lets Leslie lead. She knows this place like the back of her hand.

 

“I feel like we’re storming a castle.” She shouts.

 

***

 

The plan is simple really. Attack Nelson and his men head on at City Hall to draw them away from the house. Ben and Leslie were never supposed to be more than a distraction for April’s team to move unnoticed through the city. They were never supposed to win. Do some damage and live to fight another day. That is what Ben keeps telling himself.

 

Quickly their team spreads out to their designated posts within City Hall.  Howser, Crazy Ira, the Douche, and their sound guy take off for the 4th floor where they know Nelson is holding members of the Pawnee Alliance. Perd Hapley, Brandi Maxxx, and Marcia Langman hold the main entrance. Each wields one of the few machine guns the Pawnee Alliance has in its possession.

 

“This is for Pawnee families!” Marcia screams as she and Brandi let bullets rain down to cover Perd as he launches flash bangs.

 

Ben and Leslie sprint. They use the murals on the walls as a map to find their way through the dark and debris littered halls. At one point he slips and Leslie hauls him up.

 

“Race you!” she shouts and Ben bites back a grin.

 

“That would be childish.”

 

They do race, but not each other. They press toward the City Council’s office where Howser said Nelson would be holding meetings that morning. It had been Leslie’s idea to face him directly.

 

_“But he’ll kill you.”_

 

_“He won’t,” Leslie looked away when Ben protested. They laid supine together in his sleeping bag. “I know he won’t.”_

 

_“There’s gotta be another way.”_

 

_She shifted in his arms and held his face in her hands, “April and her team need us to keep Nelson distracted. I am the best distraction we could ask for. He thinks I know where Grace is. He won’t kill me.”_

 

_“I don’t like it.”_

 

_“I know you have the last veto. You can use it now, but I know this will work. Trust me.”_

 

_“Is that what your gut tells you?”_

 

_“No, someone else’s.”_

 

_Ben wanted to ask who, but Leslie was kissing him and he knew the truth was he loved her. He was foolish enough to follow her anywhere._

 

The doors to the City Council room are open when they get there. That should have given Ben pause, but so far all their planning had worked beautifully. For one stupid moment he thought luck might be in their favor.

 

They flank each door and pull their guns. Ben nods and Leslie pulls her door back. He covers her as she slips inside. For one brief second she disappears from his view and his heart almost stops. But then he follows her and runs into her back. Her hand is by her side and the gun is held loosely.

 

“Leslie?”

 

But then he sees what she sees Chris Traeger sitting calmly next to Tommy Nelson, smiling up at them.

 

***

 

April wades through ankle deep muck, but she doesn’t really notice. Ahead of her Mark leads the way. He stops periodically at junction points to read the strange numbers and codes etched into the walls. They are a language to him, an infrastructure he had helped build in another life.

 

Other than Ann’s occasional, “I don’t want to know what I just stepped in,” no one talks until April checks her watch. It is past 10:00 a.m.. They have been wandering around in the belly of Pawnee for almost two hours. Above them the battle has started and here they are climbing through dark tunnels.

 

“We’re lost.”

 

“No, we’re not,” Mark says. “I told you it would take a while. We’ve got to cross the city and there isn’t exactly a direct route.”

 

“But you’re sure we know where we’re going?” Ann asks.

 

“Yes. I know what I’m doing.”

 

Ann looks at April. April shines her flashlight in his face, “Those are our friends up there. Counting on us.”

 

“They used to be my friends too,” he mumbles, “come on.”

 

***

 

Once Ben and Leslie leave the only thing left to do is finish packing up the explosives. Ethel and Ron work side by side each glancing up at the clock every few minutes, waiting for the smallest hand to reach 10. That was when the first round of explosives would go off.

 

“If you’re so worried why didn’t you go with?” Ethel finally asks.

 

Ron grumbles, but says nothing. Why didn’t he go with? Because Ann asked him to stay. Because he only had one operative arm. Because he didn’t know if he would be of any help.

 

That was his real fear. What was Ron if he couldn’t help? He’d always prided himself on being useful and independent. No one needed to help him do anything. But now here he was stuck packing boxes and helping Jerry  _(Jerry!)_ herd children into cars to shuttle them to the new Pawnee Alliance headquarters in the abandoned shell of Eagleton’s Civic Center. It had been Ann’s idea to move. Once they made their move, she argued, Nelson was going to look for a way to retaliate. The idea was everyone would convene in the new location after the battle and Ron was tasked with help setting it all up like they were playing freaking house.

 

“I want to be the princess!”

 

The screech causes hairs to raise on the back of his neck.

 

“It’s my turn to be the princess!”

 

Two little girls are running after one another, fighting over a crown. Ron puts down the land mine he was packing and crosses to the glittery children.

 

“What is going on here?”

 

“Ivy took my crown and our mom said it was my turn to wear it.” The taller child stamps her foot.

 

Ron tucked his chin and tried to find patience somewhere from within. “We are in the middle of a battle. We do not have time for princesses.”

 

“My mommy is in a battle. We had to stay back here where it is boring.”

 

“We are doing important work too,” he tries.

 

“Why?”

 

“Why what?”

 

“Why is it important?”

 

“Because…because,” he stammers. He thinks of Ann and all those months she spent carving out a life for their friends at his cabin. Without her efforts and determination, Ron doesn’t think they would have made it this long. They would have splintered and gone out into the world on their own. They wouldn’t be doing this, but at the cabin they had become a family. “Because the small things matter just as much as the big ones,” Ron says. “Because having a home is the reason why we’re fighting.”

 

***

 

They cheer when they hear the gun fire.

 

“We’re probably right below City Hall,” Mark says.

 

They all look up at the ring of sunlight peaking through the manhole above their heads.

 

Ann nudges both of them, “Come on. The faster we do our job the sooner they can get the hell out of there.”

 

April pulls herself away. She does what is smart instead of what she wants. She walks away from the straight path to Nelson and focuses on putting one foot in front of the other.

 

***

 

Three guns are drawn at once: Nelson at Ben, Leslie at Chris, and Ben at Nelson.

 

Only Chris remains unarmed. He holds up both hands high in the air.

 

It is Nelson who speaks first. His smile curves into a maniacal grin and Ben realizes that this is the first time he has gotten a close look at the man. It may be the will of his imagination, but he can’t see an ounce of Grace in that man’s crazy face.

 

“Leslie Knope, it has been a long time coming,” Nelson says.

 

Ben can see Leslie’s hand shaking on the gun pointed at Chris’ head. He isn’t sure she even heard Nelson. The look that passes between her and Chris is so quick, Ben isn’t sure he even saw it. There is a long pause and every one of them watches Leslie.

 

Ben knows the look in her eyes. She is calculating, planning. He imagines a pro/con list forming in her head, but in the space of a moment she reaches whatever choice she had to make.

 

She lowers her gun and steps forward. “I came just like you wanted Nelson. Now let my town go.”

 

Ben shouts her name in a strangled cry, but she whips her head around and he can see the silent message in her eyes.

 

_Trust me._

 

“I’m glad you finally came to your senses Leslie,” Nelson says.

 

Leslie raises her chin, “I presume you want Grace.”

 

“You’re right.”

 

“I’m not just going to give her to you. Not until you’ve left Pawnee.”

 

Nelson holds up a hand held radio, “One call from me and my men can be out in an hour.”

 

“Then we should move somewhere we’ll be more comfortable,” Chris claps his hands, “Maybe the Parks Department? It gets lovely sunlight in the late morning.”

 

Ben is shaking. His finger is heavy on the trigger and all he would have to do is squeeze and all of this would be over. He has no idea what the hell is going on and he feels his plan unraveling, pooling in tattered threads at his feet. But then Leslie puts a heavy hand on his wrist and pulls his arm and the gun down.

 

“I think the Parks Department would be lovely,” she says in a voice louder than necessary. “Chris, why don’t you lead the way?”

 

 

***

 

“We’re here.” Mark announces grimly. He points to the manhole above their heads.

 

“Well, then let’s go.” April starts to the ladder, but Ann grabs her wrist.

 

“You’re not going to be the first out. It’ll either be me or Mark.”

 

“It’s my mission.”

 

“This is why I’m here,” Ann reminds her. “You promised.”

 

“I don’t know what you two are talking about, but its going to be me going out there first.” Mark huffs, “Chivalry didn’t end just because some bombs went off.”

 

April lets Ann go before her because, frankly, she isn’t given much of a choice. They rise into a damp building filled with pipes and dead mice.

 

“Ugh, where are we?” Ann scrunches her nose.

 

“It was supposed to be the beginning of a bathroom,” Mark draws his gun. “Leslie made me build it on Lot 48. From here it’s a straight shot into Ann’s house. Probably no more than a twenty yard sprint.”

 

“That’s a lot of space for bullets.” Ann glances at April’s abdomen.

 

“If everything goes according to plan there won’t be anyone here,” April counters. She eyes the gun in Ann’s hand. “You know how to shoot that thing?”

 

The other woman snorts, “I’m dating Ron Swanson.”

 

***

 

There is a single soldier sitting with his feet propped up on Ann’s dining room table. Mark holds a finger up to his lips as he eases the back door open. The soldier whips around and raises his weapon to Mark’s chest.

 

“You have two second to lower your weapon.” Mark warns the boy.

 

April notes this as she and Ann step in through the front door. He isn’t much older than she is. Can’t be.

 

“Not going to do that sir,” the boy says.

 

“I’m not going to warn you again,” Mark shouts. The boy shakes, but does not lower his arms.

 

April raises her gun, counts to two, and pulls the trigger. She puts the bullet in the back of his head and the boy crumples to the floor.

 

Next to her Ann recoils. “You didn’t have to do that,” she trembles.

 

Mark is already retrieving the gun from the fallen soldier. He shoves it into April’s arms and says without a backward glance at Ann, “Yes, she did.”

 

“He was just a kid.” Ann protests.

 

“Just because I asked to you come with doesn’t mean you’re my conscience.” April hisses.

 

“Uh, ladies,” Mark calls out from the bedroom, “We’ve got a bigger problem.”

 

“Did you find whatever it is Nelson is hiding?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“Just come look.”

 

And there it is sitting in Ann’s bedroom - a bomb.

 

***

 

“You know there is nothing left for you in New D.C..” Leslie says as they sit down around the Parks conference table.

 

Around them the building has grown quiet. Nelson radioed to his men to retreat and Ben let Howser know everyone was to stand their ground, but stop firing. It is eery - Ben and Leslie on one side of the table and Nelson and Chris on the other.

 

“My father and Harvey Grist are making sure of that. We found the evidence of what you did.”

 

“Leslie,” Nelson chuckles, “do you really think I’m going to let a few computer files stop me? Your father and Grist were fools to think they could hide my daughter from me and they are fools to think they can stop me now. Chris, here came to me just in time to warn me about their plans against me.”

 

Leslie’s eyes never shift away from Nelson, “What about Emily?”

 

“What about her?”

 

“You tortured and murdered the mother of your own daughter.”

 

His eyes narrow, “She betrayed me.”

 

“She was serving her country.”

 

“WHAT COUNTRY?” His fists slam down on the table and even Leslie flinches. “We weren’t a country. We were a bunch of greedy, pathetic masses who grew complacent. We were literally rotting from the inside out.”

 

“So you killed millions?”

 

“I did what I did for this country.”

 

Ben eyes the guns they all set on the table. He wonders if he would be fast enough to put a bullet in Nelson’s brain. He know he is. The question is what Chris would do. Would he pick up one of those guns and shoot Leslie before Ben could stop him?

 

Leslie leans across the table, “Were you there when my sister died? Did you watch or were you too much of a coward? Did you hide behind other people to do your dirty work? Did you look her in the eye when she refused to ever give up our father or the location of those files? Is that why you finally killed her? Because she wouldn’t give you Grace. Give me a reason why I shouldn’t kill you.”

 

“Cause you’re going to trade a little girl you call your daughter,” Nelson sneers. “You’re going to give her over to someone like me just to save a town full of people you don’t even know. You and I aren’t that different.”

 

Ben leans toward his own gun, but Nelson waves a finger. “There are four of us and only three guns. One side is going to have the slower guy. Let’s not let this get ugly when we’re so close to both getting what we want.”

 

Never in his life has Ben required ever ounce of discipline his training gave him. All he can see is red. Leslie and Nelson and the room blur and for some unknown reason he notices Chris’ hands on the table. His pointer fingers are extended toward Ben and he remembers all those years ago the first time he met Chris Traeger.

 

_“Hey buddy_ , _” the man said, pointing at him with both hands slung into the shape of guns. “Hey buddy.”_

 

And there it is. In that tiny gesture, Ben understands. He extends one of his own pointer fingers and sees Chris’ eyes darken. He taps _one_ ,  _two, three_  and both of them move. Ben doesn’t go for the gun. He lunges himself over Leslie, shielding her with his body.

 

He trusts Chris to put a bullet in Thomas Nelson.

 

He trusts Chris.

 

Never in his life did Ben think he’d be able to do that again. He never thought he’d get his partner back.

 

But there it is - the first crack and then the second. Ben picks himself off the floor. Leslie is scrambling out from underneath him, yelling Chris’ name.

 

His partner lies crumpled across the table, blood dribbling out of the hole shot in his chest.

 

“Ben,” Chris chokes.

 

It is Leslie who moves the fastest. Nelson is backing out of the room, limping from Chris’ bullet, and Leslie charges him. She rams him in the chest and goes toppling down with him out into the middle of the Parks department. Ben takes two steps after her, but Chris’ hand reaches out for his wrist.

 

“Ben,” he pulls Ben closer to his face. There is no color left in the once healthy, vibrant man’s skin. “She’s in Muncie with Jerry’s daughters. Find her. Keep her safe.”

 

And then the life slips out of him and Ben doesn’t even have time to let the howl stuck in his throat. Leslie is wrestling on the ground with Thomas Nelson. He’s got her pinned to the floor with his hands around her throat. She is turning bright red and Ben can feel everything he loves collapsing in on itself.  He casts around for a gun, but they’ve been thrown across the room.

 

“Leslie,” he shouts as he scrambles over chairs, “Use your leverage.”

 

And the sound of his voice seems to bring her back because Ben can see the determination in her eyes as she hooks her knees around Nelson’s chest and flips them over. The man’s shock loosens his grip and Leslie takes a ragged breath. Ben’s hands finally find a gun underneath the table and he calls out Leslie’s name. Nelson smacks Leslie across the face and sends her flying off him. He lunges at her, but Ben tosses the gun to her through the broken window separating them and in a moment to fast to even register, she catches it, settles it into her palm like he taught her, and pulls the trigger.

 

Neither of them even cringe when the shot rings out.

 

 

***

 

“This is not a normal bomb.” Ann says.

 

“What the hell is a normal bomb?” April rolls her eyes.

 

“You need to get out of here, now.”

 

“Are you insane?”

 

But there is something in Ann’s eyes, a wild fear, that April hasn’t seen before.

 

“April, this is nuclear. You  _need to get out of here._ ” Ann pleads. “Even if this thing doesn’t go off it could still kill your baby.”

 

“Baby? What baby?” Mark points between the two of them.

 

“I’m pregnant.”

 

“Are all of you people insane?” he backs away from them. “How do we even know its nuclear?”

 

“Because when he was at the cabin Chris drew the bombs for me that Nelson used on those cities,” Ann sputters, “Grist had shown him the schematics and I was the only one who would talk to him. This is that bomb.”

 

“We’re supposed to trust your memory of something sketched on a napkin.”

 

“It makes sense,” Ann counters, “If Nelson couldn’t find Leslie or Grace in Pawnee it makes sense he would have no compunction about blowing it up.”

 

“Don’t you think it is a bit drastic?”

 

“This is the man who blew up thirteen American cities because he wanted to be in power. Drastic isn’t even on his radar.” Ann fists both hands, “We do not have time to argue about this. We’ve got to move this thing.”

 

“Now I know you are all insane.” Mark rubs a hand over his face.

 

Ann fumbles with her backpack and turns on the hand held radio Ben had given her.

 

“What are you doing?” April demands.

 

“April, I’m serious if you don’t start running in the opposite direction of this bomb I swear to god I will pick you up and carry you out.” Ann threatens. “Now let’s hope to hell Leslie has an idea.”

 

 

***

 

They pull Chris’ body into Leslie’s old office, but they have nothing to cover him with except Ben’s bloodstained jacket.

 

“How did you know you could trust him?” Ben hooks an arm around her waist. She does the same and they lean on each other.

 

“Grist.”

 

“Harvey Grist?”

 

“After I left New D.C. he followed me and caught up with me just outside Virginia.”

 

“What did he want?”

 

“He told me my dad was wrong to not care more about Nelson essentially holding a town hostage. He said if I went back he’d go looking for Chris and Grace. He’d come to Pawnee once she was safe. I didn’t tell anyone cause I really didn’t think it would matter. I didn’t want us to plan on trusting Harvey Grist of all people.”

 

“And when you saw Chris?”

 

“I made a choice to trust that he was here with Grist.  In everything that has happened never once did we suspect Chris Traeger of being in league with Nelson.”

 

“He could have been playing his own agenda.”

 

“He could, but I took a chance and it worked out.”

 

Ben shuts the door to the Parks department behind them. He knows they’ll be back once Nelson’s men leave Pawnee. There will be work to be done, but for now they could close the door.

 

“So where is Grist?”

 

Leslie pauses, “You know I’m not sure.”

 

***

 

“You know your dad would be proud of you,” Harvey Grist says to Leslie.

 

“I don’t know if that is a compliment.” Leslie shields her eyes from the setting sun.

 

The battle for Pawnee was over and the only thing left to do was to figure out what to do with the nuclear weapon sitting in Ann’s former bedroom. She laughs a little when she thinks that. How her life has changed and she wonders how much she has changed with it. She remembers the notebook of choices she started right after the bombs. It had been a tally of things Leslie Knope did to survive. At some point that list had become irrelevant because the Leslie Knope who survived was who she is now. She couldn’t go back anymore than the world could; they were all going to have to find a new way of being.

 

Her wonderful, battle weary friends all stand in Lot 48. Tom and Mark guard the bomb, but really no one in Pawnee even knows it is there. The city is busy putting itself back together in the wake of the battle. The fleet of Mercedes that the army drove (confiscated from the Pawnee Mercedes dealership) is parked on the street in front of Ann’s house. Donna, Tom, and their team had stolen them making it impossible for Nelson’s men to call for back up at City Hall. As they spoke, troops were already heading out of Pawnee on foot, streaming away and toward whatever lives they wanted to live. Grist had somehow found his way into Donna’s Mercedes and arrived at Lot 48 with the team just as Leslie and Ben got there.

 

“Then I’ll put it this way,” Grist says. “Your mother would be proud of you.”

 

Leslie’s throat tightens and nods, “Thank you.”

 

“So what are we going to do about the bomb?” Ben asks.

 

“It looks intact,” Grist says, “which means it should be safe to transport. It was designed to be mobile in the first place.”

 

“Yeah, well I don’t feel comfortable just handing it over to the government in New D.C..” Ron says.

 

“I agree,” Ben echoes.

 

“You’re right.” Grist says.

 

“Aren’t you like Brad Zale’s number one guy?” April glowers.

 

When Leslie had arrived the girl had pulled a knife on Grist. Only Mark was holding her back. It had been Leslie who looped her arms around April until she had chosen to drop the knife in the grass. She slumped against Leslie and muttered something about Andy and a feeling in the pit of her stomach. Leslie keeps April close to her now. Even though April had chosen to put down the knife, no one was sure she wouldn’t change her mind again.

 

“We’re not Nelson.” Grist says, “We’re not innocent, but we’re not him.”

 

“Then what do we do?” Ann asks.

 

“We disarm it.” Leslie says.

 

“But how?”

 

“There is a guy in Colorado,” Grist offers. “He used to work for the DOD. He’s still alive as far as I know and he can help us.”

 

Leslie nods, “Okay, but we’re not moving it. I don’t trust anyone outside of this group with this thing. You bring him to Pawnee.”

 

“I’m going with,” April steps up.

 

Leslie might be seeing things, but she thinks she actually sees Grist blanche.

 

“No,” Ann shakes her head, “that’s not safe.”

 

“Then come with me,” April juts her chin out, “I didn’t get to revenge Andy’s death so this is what I’m going to do. I’m going to make sure this bomb never goes off.”

 

Leslie isn’t sure what passes between Ann and April, but it is a some sort of understanding.

 

“Fine,” Ann shifts uncomfortably, “I’ll come. I’ll keep you from doing something stupid.”

 

Leslie bites back a smile. She isn’t the only one who has made different choices in the wake of the bombs. She remembers Ann’s arguments why Leslie should not return to Pawnee, why she should stay in the safe cocoon of Ron’s cabin. Sometime since, Ann decided the world was worth returning to. Each of them would take their own time, Leslie realizes. April would take her time to get over Andy’s death. Ann and Ron would take their time to find a future together. She and Ben would work through the ways they had hurt one another and Pawnee would rebuild. Piece by piece, they would all find a new way of being.

 

“If you’re going then I’m going.” Ron steps up beside Ann.

 

“You people are like the damn Brady Bunch.” Grist mutters.

 

“First,” Leslie says, “Jerry, Ben, and I are going to Muncie. To find our daughters.”

 

***

 

**ONE YEAR LATER**

 

They celebrate Grace’s second birthday in a park.

 

It is just Leslie and Ben and Grace.

 

She needs these moments of just them, quiet ones in a park. That was what she and Ben fought so hard to give their daughter. Birthday picnics in the park. Her father pushing her on the swings like he is doing now. Grace squeals as Ben pushes her higher. Leslie waves from where she kneels on the blanket. She is unpacking their lunch, but she sets aside the cupcakes Ann made for later.

 

The birthday celebration is a few months late. Really Grace is more than two years old, but Leslie wanted to wait until the bomb was gone and Pawnee was truly safe again. For the past year Grace had lived at Ron’s cabin where there was a bomb shelter. When they had returned from Colorado with the scientist, April finally gave in and agreed to stay up there too during her pregnancy and then after her son had been born. Ann presided over the place with baked goods, lectures about adequate sleep, and childhood development tools. Ben and Leslie traded time between the cabin and Pawnee as she rebuilt. One of them was always with Grace and often the other with the bomb or bent over plans at City Hall; they had been partners before, but in the past year Leslie felt the weight of time. It had transformed them into true partners and slowly old hurts had been put to rest in a way that only time could heal.

 

It’d taken months and a lot of planning for Leslie and Harvey to safely dismantle and move the pieces of the bomb so they could never be recovered. They kept it a secret from her father, now president, and when the bomb was finally gone Leslie had hugged her father’s partner.

 

“Stay and help us build something,” she told him.

 

“No, places like Pawnee aren’t built for men like me and your dad,” Harvey said, “I learned that watching your dad try twice. Besides your dad is my family. Always has been.”

 

Now Leslie watches Ben push Grace and mulls over what Harvey said. She doesn’t know if she agrees with him. You make choices, she thinks, and those choices determine who you are. Ben made a choice. He chose her and Grace and Pawnee. He could have chosen differently. She could have chosen differently, but eventually they found their way back to one another and knowing that both of them made that choice is proof to Leslie it is true love. Maybe some choices are harder than others, but in the end Leslie still believes you choose what kind of person you will be.

 

_But its not that simple_. Ann told her that the night Leslie slept with Ben. At the time it hadn’t felt like she had any choice except to be pulled into his orbit and him into her’s. So maybe men like Grist and her father didn’t have a choice; family would always be impossible. Too many scars. Too many secrets.

 

Whatever it is, Leslie doesn’t really care to have it figured out. She doesn’t need a master plan; she couldn’t make one now if she tried. The world was too precarious and too precious.

 

“Hey, get over here Knope!” Ben shouts. Grace yelps and Leslie pushes herself to her feet. She feels the envelope with her name on it crinkle in her jean pocket. It isn’t the original one Harvey left with Grace. That one was lost a long time ago. No, this is the one Emily left with Leslie’s name on it in the closet of that house as if she always knew Leslie would be the one to figure it out.  _Go big or go home._

 

She doesn’t need to take it out to know what it says. She reads it aloud to Grace sometimes before bed. They are the only words the little girl will ever hear in her first mother’s voice and Leslie wants her to know Emily. She wants Grace to someday be as brave and good and true as Emily.

 

“Are you swinging high?” Leslie puts her arms up in the air as Grace flies and laughs, “How does it feel?”

 

***

 

_Daddy told me once that the nucleus of something is its core; it’s the central and essential part of something. He said the power resides in the nucleus. Split it and you’ve gone and atomized it. I’ve thought a lot about that the further I get drawn into this. I don’t think I’m going to survive this though I don’t tell Daddy that. He worries too much. I’m telling you though, Leslie, because when I was growing up, after Daddy left, I talked to you in my head. I spilled all my secrets to my older sister. You always had the right thing to say._

 

_Why can so much potential destruction exist in something so basic as a nucleus? I’ve decided its because we’re not supposed to exist alone. When you break the nucleus of something you take what was once in relationship and render it free-floating and untethered. You break the very laws of what it was. And this is the law of being:  two or three gathered._

 

_Sometimes I imagine what it would be like if I had known you. It would be you, me, and my daughter. I like to think our bond would be so strong that you’d know me even though you never met me. Leslie, maybe I am a fool to hope you will be the one to find this. I don’t even know you, but I feel like I do. Daddy used to talk about you and Marlene and Pawnee. It sounded like this magical place where happy endings might actually still exist. If hoping that my daughter might have that - even after all the bad things I know exist - makes me a fool then I will be one gladly._

 


End file.
